Cheating husband

  • Thread starter Thread starter Renwoman
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
Renwoman said:
I posted here because I wanted encouragment and support with my forgiveness and my grace. I posted here because I saw I was NOT the only one who had very similar posts.

I posted because the other posts about the very same thing, gave me courage to post. I did not feel so alone. Maybe make a friend whom could help me and I them? Many reasons to post here.

Thank you to those who could see my post for what it was and thank you for the encouragement and hope.

My husband has shown much remorse and has changed his ways.
Click to expand...
forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=965492
Here is a thread that may help you.
  1. It is a far worse situation than yours, but at the same time, similar in danger.
  2. It might help you to see that many times a character or identity is there for a long time it does not just appear and then go away.
Do I believe your husband could change his ways? Yes. I believe that is possible. But for that to happen, (ask any addict) one has to be honest with the real root of the issue. And I don’t think anyone, including you, can really state he has changed after 10 months of being sorry for being caught. While I believe your husband can change for the better and be the man he should be, I also do not believe this is a one time episode that happened after 25 years of being a good and holy man, simply because his elderly mother died and he has scummy friends. This was almost certainly ongoing and any denial of that fact will halt any effort for him to make a real change. A change in character is harder than dropping a habit. It is changing your soul. That takes time, honesty and therapy. And of course, prayer.
Keep ongoing tests for STDs for him and you. (Note on the other thread this is a life threatening issue) And GET A PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR.

God Bless you.
 
Renwoman said:
I posted here because I wanted encouragment and support with my forgiveness and my grace. I posted here because I saw I was NOT the only one who had very similar posts.

I posted because the other posts about the very same thing, gave me courage to post. I did not feel so alone. Maybe make a friend whom could help me and I them? Many reasons to post here.

Thank you to those who could see my post for what it was and thank you for the encouragement and hope.

My husband has shown much remorse and has changed his ways.
Click to expand...
No one is trying to be unkind, or to beat you up. Your posts have many red flags, things that are easy for outsiders to see but harder for you to see. I’ve been there, myself, where people could see problems in my relationships that I myself was blinded to. In hindsight, I wish I’d listened to them.

And the thing about internet forums is that you don’t always get the response you want. In order for us to give you what you wanted to hear, we’d have had to validate something that is obviously wrong. Hoosier Daddy’s signature line is apropos, here: I’d rather be slapped with the truth than kissed with a lie. You seem to desperately want to be kissed with a lie and angry that no one here is willing to do that.

The reality is that most people who cheat are habitual cheaters. Since your husband didn’t have a drunken one night stand with a single individual, but rather had relations with a number of women over a long period of time, that’s a huge concern. The fact that he lied to you for many months is concerning. The fact that his admission came only after you caught him is concerning. The fact that you defend him by stating that he was going through a rough patch because his mom died and his dad wasn’t there for him and he had bad friends is concerning because it’s deflecting the responsibility from your husband for his actions onto other people, and no one is responsible for your husband’s actions but your husband. You never say if he himself uses these excuses, or if these are your excuses for him, but the death of a mother, the indifference of a father and some bad friends are not an excuse for infidelity. Period. Everyone goes through rough patches. And we’re all exposed to bad influences, especially in this day and age. There will be other rough patches, other temptations, at some point in the future. You need to know that your husband isn’t going to use the next rough patch or temptation as his excuse to run out and engage in affairs and then lie to you about it again.

I do believe your marriage can be saved, but I don’t think anything will change until you take off the blinders and stop making excuses for your husband’s behavior. You both need counseling- him to overcome his predilection for infidelity and so that he can accept his responsibility for it and work on truly making amends, and you so that you can get out of denial about the fact that this is 100% on him, not his mother, his father, his antidepressants or his friends. If he really is a sex addict, and that’s not just an excuse, then he needs ongoing therapy for that or he will probably fall back into his old ways.

I know this is painful to hear, but it’s also necessary. I hope at some point that you will stop being angry at people for not telling you what you want to hear, and instead recognize that people are telling you what you *need *to hear.
 
I know a man who was hit across the back by a log at a remote logging work site. He was airlifted out, taken into surgery, and woke up with an incision running up his middle like a zipper. The doctor came in and told him that he was lucky that he had not lost his kidney. The man said, “Lucky H#$L! If I was lucky, I wouldn’t have been hit by a tree!” It took him months, but he eventually recovered completely and died in his own bed, an old man in his late '80s.

In that context, I will tell you this: You and your husband, in a sense, are lucky. He is not a serial cheater–I mean, he was faithful for over two decades and he has been faithful since his period of infidelities. He* is* capable of fidelity. He does have the character and the desire to go back to being a faithful husband. He made some very bad decisions at a very vulnerable time in his life, but through counselling he can learn how to avoid that in the future and through studiously avoiding the near occasions of this sin he can eventually deserve to regain your trust. You have not picked up any infections and there are no illegitimate children compounding the need for mercy and compassion. You can get through this and you can move past it. You can forgive him, you can work past the pain, and he can forgive himself, too.

I would suggest a book for you: “How to Forgive: A Step-By-Step Guide” by John Monbourquette, a priest and psychologist. I don’t mean you’re going to find every word of it something you’re going to follow to the letter, but it has some useful concepts in it. It might help your husband in coming to terms with what his dad has been doing to him, too. There are probably other fine books out there, but this is one I’m familiar with and have learned a lot from. It includes examples of how to deal (and not deal) with infidelity and with wounds coming from unreliable family members.

Don’t expect yourselves to get by this in a day. This is a process. It is going to take a while to wrap your mind around what happened, what your husband did, what has been done to him, and to sort out the complexity of it. Remember this: the main thing is to rebuild your marriage (which will be different than before, both for better and for worse) and to let go of resentment and unrealistic expectations in favor of forgiveness and a more serene acceptance of reality.

Honestly, you sound as if you are doing all the right things. It takes awhile, that’s all. If your house is flooded by some big storm, it takes awhile to clean up. There will be some mourning over the losses that can never be replaced. It takes awhile to decide how to prevent damage the next time a storm comes through. It is expensive, it is hard work, but what else are you going to do? You can’t live in the past. You can’t spend time obsessing about the future. God’s grace is all in this moment and in what you have to do right now. With the help you are getting, you’ll be able to return to living there. You have an excellent foundation, even with the earthquake you’ve been through. Don’t be afraid to hang in there. Maybe you won’t succeed, there are no guarantees, but I would bet that you will get through this. Your path will be hard, but your prognosis is actually excellent. You have all the marks of a couple who will survive this, so don’t be afraid to take comfort in that thought.
 
EasterJoy said:
I know a man who was hit across the back by a log at a remote logging work site. He was airlifted out, taken into surgery, and woke up with an incision running up his middle like a zipper. The doctor came in and told him that he was lucky that he had not lost his kidney. The man said, “Lucky H#$L! If I was lucky, I wouldn’t have been hit by a tree!” It took him months, but he eventually recovered completely and died in his own bed, an old man in his late '80s.

In that context, I will tell you this: You and your husband, in a sense, are lucky. He is not a serial cheater–I mean, he was faithful for over two decades and he has been faithful since his period of infidelities. He* is* capable of fidelity. He does have the character and the desire to go back to being a faithful husband. He made some very bad decisions at a very vulnerable time in his life, but through counselling he can learn how to avoid that in the future and through studiously avoiding the near occasions of this sin he can eventually deserve to regain your trust. You have not picked up any infections and there are no illegitimate children compounding the need for mercy and compassion. You can get through this and you can move past it. You can forgive him, you can work past the pain, and he can forgive himself, too.

I would suggest a book for you: “How to Forgive: A Step-By-Step Guide” by John Monbourquette, a priest and psychologist. I don’t mean you’re going to find every word of it something you’re going to follow to the letter, but it has some useful concepts in it. It might help your husband in coming to terms with what his dad has been doing to him, too. There are probably other fine books out there, but this is one I’m familiar with and have learned a lot from. It includes examples of how to deal (and not deal) with infidelity and with wounds coming from unreliable family members.

Don’t expect yourselves to get by this in a day. This is a process. It is going to take a while to wrap your mind around what happened, what your husband did, what has been done to him, and to sort out the complexity of it. Remember this: the main thing is to rebuild your marriage (which will be different than before, both for better and for worse) and to let go of resentment and unrealistic expectations in favor of forgiveness and a more serene acceptance of reality.

Honestly, you sound as if you are doing all the right things. It takes awhile, that’s all. If your house is flooded by some big storm, it takes awhile to clean up. There will be some mourning over the losses that can never be replaced. It takes awhile to decide how to prevent damage the next time a storm comes through. It is expensive, it is hard work, but what else are you going to do? You can’t live in the past. You can’t spend time obsessing about the future. God’s grace is all in this moment and in what you have to do right now. With the help you are getting, you’ll be able to return to living there. You have an excellent foundation, even with the earthquake you’ve been through. Don’t be afraid to hang in there. Maybe you won’t succeed, there are no guarantees, but I would bet that you will get through this. Your path will be hard, but your prognosis is actually excellent. You have all the marks of a couple who will survive this, so don’t be afraid to take comfort in that thought.
Click to expand...
Yes. 👍
 
Some of the answers here are pretty bad. Why are you encouraging her to further suspicion? SSRIs can really mess with a person and I’d say that while yes, he did do what he did and they have to live with the repercussions of that, he is not fully responsible. Some people seem to have no idea how much those drugs can affect people. The OP says he was “not himself” and I believe that. Add in the emotional turmoil and it’s not all that difficult to understand.

I’ve seen it myself and it can be an awful thing. And yes, they do make many people “manic” and cut off emotionally - that is essentially what they are designed to do. You’re not dealing with reality while on mind altering drugs.

Have a bit on empathy for both of these people! I get the sense that they can recover from this and encouraging silliness with lie detectors is unhelpful. People kill themselves while on psychotropic meds - are they fully responsible? Those things are Satan pills as far as I’m concerned.
 
AKDee said:
…The reality is that most people who cheat are habitual cheaters…The fact that he lied to you for many months is concerning. The fact that his admission came only after you caught him is concerning…
Click to expand...
There is nothing more common in all the world than lying about failures we are ashamed of. If any of us has gone thirty days without covering for ourselves by direct lies or by lies of omission, I would be extremely surprised. Researchers have found that most people, if they hold themselves to a strict standard of honesty about failures that others have some right to know about, cannot go a single day without a direct lie or a cover-up to make themselves look better than they are.

So of course her husband lied about his cheating. Most cheaters who tell without getting caught do it because they want relief from guilt. Yes, some immediately confess in order to come clean and to keep themselves from falling again, but let’s not pretend how often that happens.

Is the cheating a concern? Of course it is! Still, lying about it is almost always a part of doing it. The question is what the husband and wife are doing to prevent a repeat. I would think their counselors are helping them through that.
AKDee said:
I do believe your marriage can be saved, but I don’t think anything will change until you take off the blinders and stop making excuses for your husband’s behavior. You both need counseling…
Click to expand...
They are getting counselling. This process of “taking the blinders off” is just that: a process. They are both going to go through many iterations of how they tell this story to themselves and others. Time will tell whether or not her husband truly is trustworthy. I do think it is premature to deem him a sex addict. He has fallen in a way that many men (and women–it does take two) have done over the centuries, when vulnerability and opportunity unfortunately overwhelmed virtue. We are all “sin addicts,” prone to fall off the wagon. Still, some couples use such a fall to build up virtue, and there truly is a return to fidelity, a fidelity which has an even stronger foundation. It does happen.

The Twelve Steps of AA are actually a prescription for the Catholic moral life. Look it up. Use the word “sin” to replace the word “alcohol.” Examine, confess, make amends, rely on God from day to day and moment to moment, and try again. Encourage others to do the same. It is what we do.
 
@ easter joy…thank you. Someone who actually gets it. Ssri meds will be banned from the market in coming years. Another shooting today and guess what? Ssri meds. My neighbor was put on prozac and within two weeks he hung himself. His wife was shocked as he was so out of character.
my husband got very odd with the Ssri meds. We run a million dollar business and I related it all to stress. We work a zillion hours together. We farm 50 acres also. We do lots of stuff with the kids. Snowskiing and wsterskiing all summer.
anyway. …he became obcessive compulsive. Easily agitated hyper, loud and outgoing. Demanding and was swearing like he never ever did.
its the ssri meds because he has been off of them and he does nit swear and his personality is back. This judt does not change overnight unlesd it was a drug that is now gone.
Now that he is off of them he can see how crazy and driven he was
he was trying to get caught. He was out of control and did not know what to do.i am the one that is here to help him and this time it was me whom he would destroy if he asked for help. Of course he was lying.
Just like a kid lies about smoking or drugs.
it is over. He sticks with me all day every day.not one call to friends or women. I check everyday. All computers have blocks on them and all smart phones as well. It emails me even if he tries to look up someone. 10 months and he has been acountable.
pray for us easter joy and thank you.
.
 
Renwoman said:
Will God forgive him? How do I make my marriage vows clean again?
I am so shocked that this can happen to such good man. The devil is everywhere.
My Husband actually said he felt driven by something other than himself. Was it the medication making him manic or was it some other force? Just so confused.
Any kind words? Thoughts? prayers?
I have stuck by his side in spite of being sick and mad and hurt and so many other things.
He says he wants to be a loving family forever and wishes he could step back in time. He says he wishes he could go back five years and even erase meeting the guys friends. Just the thought of them makes him sick.
Click to expand...
Renwoman, you would be surprised at how often this scenario happens. It is typical midlife crisis. These are people of high integrity, hard workers, striving to be good and faithful. It is most often triggered by the death of a parent or family member or friend at a vulnerable moment. People revert to a kind of teenage entitled mentality which they didn’t experience when that stage normally passes.

I can give you some assurance from experience. I was involved with a catholic counselling organisation for a very long time and saw this same scenario present in what seemed to be off the same script. (I wasn’t a counsellor but was privy to clients struggles as a support/companion person) What comes out of the mess is a ‘new’ marriage for those willing to keep trying. These new marriages are so much more rich and real for many couples with greater love and appreciation and acceptance being part of the package that wasn’t there before.

I’m really pleased that you are in counselling. Keep at it and have faith. :hug3:
 
@ Longing soul, Thank you as well. These are the stories of encouragement I like to hear. people who have seen this terrible stuff work out and even with some additional attributes.

Not to make excuses for my husband for what he did…but there were a LOT of contributing factors here. Even more than I have posted here ( keeping some of this private). he will turn 50 in a few days. Mid life crisis??? Sure, Im sure this has something to do with it as well.
When my husband went to his Dr for std check, he confessed all that he had done ( by the way he was protecting himself from STDs). His family Dr says " You have a lot of healing to do and you are a lucky man that your wife is letting you stay, but I want to let you know…you are NOT alone. I see this all the time at this age. Many do not get caught and some do."
I feel sad for the " many" women who do not know why the husband is acting odd, and whom never find out until the husband actually falls in love and just leaves them. I do see this all the time at this age.
I have the opportunity to rebuild. Many do not.
My faith has held me together through this.
I have seen what I swear are divine interventions through all of this as well.
 
Renwoman, I think you were addressing me and not Easter Joy, but nevertheless, I would be wary of such concepts as “mid-life crisis”. These sorts of things become self-fulfilling prophesies, in my opinion, and like “adolescence” are essentially made up “phases” of life that historically didn’t exist.

Until recently, people were considered adults at 12/13. I think labelling this a “mid-life crisis” minimises what was really going on - that is, a huge spiritual attack. A crisis for sure, but it tends to happen not because of mid-life but because that’s the time people tend to lose parents and things like that and are thus vulnerable. It’s just called life.

You might want to do some research on pharmakeia as well. I think much of what gets prescribed for spiritual and emotional ills falls under this category. If it were me, I would also make an effort forget this “accountability” stuff or at least put a definite end date on it, and same with the counselling, since they won’t acknowledge this aspect of it either, but you do what you need to.

It says a lot that most on here seem to be totally ignoring the impact of SSRIs. He wasn’t himself and it wasn’t a “mid-life crisis”; it was mind altering drugs (pharmakeia). The doctor won’t say that of course, so I’d take that with a large grain of salt too. I doubt the drugs will be banned though; follow the money.

Just my two cents; take it or leave it. You and your husband have an opportunity to do some research and learn something about how deep the proverbial rabbit hole goes. You’re really at the edge of it now. Good luck.
 
Thag_Jones said:
Renwoman, I think you were addressing me and not Easter Joy, but nevertheless, I would be wary of such concepts as “mid-life crisis”. These sorts of things become self-fulfilling prophesies, in my opinion, and like “adolescence” are essentially made up “phases” of life that historically didn’t exist.

Until recently, people were considered adults at 12/13. I think labelling this a “mid-life crisis” minimises what was really going on - that is, a huge spiritual attack. A crisis for sure, but it tends to happen not because of mid-life but because that’s the time people tend to lose parents and things like that and are thus vulnerable. It’s just called life.

You might want to do some research on pharmakeia as well. I think much of what gets prescribed for spiritual and emotional ills falls under this category. If it were me, I would also make an effort forget this “accountability” stuff or at least put a definite end date on it, and same with the counselling, since they won’t acknowledge this aspect of it either, but you do what you need to.

It says a lot that most on here seem to be totally ignoring the impact of SSRIs. He wasn’t himself and it wasn’t a “mid-life crisis”; it was mind altering drugs (pharmakeia). The doctor won’t say that of course, so I’d take that with a large grain of salt too. I doubt the drugs will be banned though; follow the money.

Just my two cents; take it or leave it. You and your husband have an opportunity to do some research and learn something about how deep the proverbial rabbit hole goes. You’re really at the edge of it now. Good luck.
Click to expand...
“You and your husband have an opportunity to do some research and learn something about how deep the proverbial rabbit hole goes. You’re really at the edge of it now.”

Would I be right to guess that you have experienced a cheating spouse and a subsequent divorce? I am very sorry if that is the case.

In a case like this OP’s the spouse has shown genuine remorse and is taking solid steps to rebuild the marriage. The difficult part of this is Renwomans natural hurt, confusion and loss of trust. As counterintuitive as it seems, these wounds can’t be repaired simply by the cheating spouses remorse and efforts (although they are necessary). She has to do the self work to trust from a new place.

A lot of people who come into counselling resist the self work part because it feels like they are taking some of the blame for what the cheating spouse did. That’s not what it is about though. It is about building a healthy independence where trust is based on a more realistic human relationship.

Many people when they are in the first phases of marriage would say that they would never stay with a spouse who cheats. The truth is though that in marriages like the OPs… long, loving and faithful that suddenly hit a glitch… there is a much fuller understanding of the power of marriage and love to overcome and renew and grow.

I’m not talking through my hat. I observed it not only through my work life but through the marriages around me that have lasted through these traumas. It takes heroism and humility to traverse, but the rewards can be great.
 
Renwoman said:
@ easter joy…thank you. Someone who actually gets it. Ssri meds will be banned from the market in coming years. Another shooting today and guess what? Ssri meds. My neighbor was put on prozac and within two weeks he hung himself. His wife was shocked as he was so out of character.
my husband got very odd with the Ssri meds. We run a million dollar business and I related it all to stress. We work a zillion hours together. We farm 50 acres also. We do lots of stuff with the kids. Snowskiing and wsterskiing all summer.
anyway. …he became obcessive compulsive. Easily agitated hyper, loud and outgoing. Demanding and was swearing like he never ever did.
its the ssri meds because he has been off of them and he does nit swear and his personality is back. This judt does not change overnight unlesd it was a drug that is now gone.
Now that he is off of them he can see how crazy and driven he was
he was trying to get caught. He was out of control and did not know what to do.i am the one that is here to help him and this time it was me whom he would destroy if he asked for help. Of course he was lying.
Just like a kid lies about smoking or drugs.
it is over. He sticks with me all day every day.not one call to friends or women. I check everyday. All computers have blocks on them and all smart phones as well. It emails me even if he tries to look up someone. 10 months and he has been acountable.
pray for us easter joy and thank you.
.
Click to expand...
Here is the thing that I think the two of you get: Violations against the moral law, even when culpability is mitigated in some degree, violates the innocence of the person who commits the violation. As I remember, the root of the word “innocence” implies being “unwounded.” You and your husband have both been wounded: you in your trust and he in his knowledge of the thrills and pleasures of sexual sin. Sin almost always has at least some pleasure to offer, if only at first. (Eventually, when a person becomes aware of being enslaved to the sin and has become inured to or even bored with the whole thing, that can be a very different matter.)

If, for instance, a man goes to war and has to pull the trigger and kill other men, that does not make him guilty of murder. It does wound his innocence with regards to the act of killing. Likewise, your husband’s experience with other women, even if it could be proven to have been something for which he was not at all culpable, would have wounded his virtue in any case where he can remember having committed the act. He can now “picture himself” doing these things. In some moments, he will be able to remember the pleasure and the thrill. Some day, his repugnance at what he did may wear off and the memory of the pleasure may be whipped up by the evil one into a more vivid temptation than was possible before he fell. This is both a cross to bear for him and something that makes virtue harder. I am concerned that your husband will go beyond mere humility at realizing that the strength of his virtue was partly rooted in a sensible temperament all the way to developing a contempt for himself instead of greater compassion for those who perhaps don’t have anything like your husband’s natural physical capacity for self-control even on a good day.

The good thing is that it seems as if it has also taught him not to take his virtue for granted. He doesn’t believe, as many of us arrogantly do, that “I’m not the kind of fellow who would do such a thing.” He knows he is capable of doing such a thing. The good sign is that he is steering clear of it.

This is a passage from the Screwtape Letters (by C.S. Lewis) in which a demon writing with advice to another demon brings this point home: The most alarming thing in your last account of the patient is that he is making none of those confident resolutions which marked his original conversion. No more lavish promises of perpetual virtue, I gather; not even the expectation of an endowment of “grace” for life, but only a hope for the daily and hourly pittance to meet the daily and hourly temptation! This is very bad….

I’ll tack on the entire chapter in a future post.
 
This is a chapter of Screwtape Letters that might help your husband see what use to make of his fall and what pitfalls to avoid:

XIV
MY DEAR WORMWOOD,

The most alarming thing in your last account of the patient is that he is making none of those confident resolutions which marked his original conversion. No more lavish promises of perpetual virtue, I gather; not even the expectation of an endowment of “grace” for life, but only a hope for the daily and hourly pittance to meet the daily and hourly temptation! This is very bad.

I see only one thing to do at the moment. **Your patient has become humble; have you drawn his attention to the fact? ****All virtues are less formidable to us once the man is aware that he has them, but this is specially true of humility. **Catch him at the moment when he is really poor in spirit and smuggle into his mind the gratifying reflection, “By jove! I’m being humble”, and almost immediately pride - pride at his own humility - will appear. If he awakes to the danger and tries to smother this new form of pride, make him proud of his attempt - and so on, through as many stages as you please. But don’t try this too long, for fear you awake his sense of humour and proportion, in which case he will merely laugh at you and go to bed.

But there are other profitable ways of fixing his attention on the virtue of Humility. By this virtue, as by all the others, our Enemy wants to turn the man’s attention away from self to Him, and to the man’s neighbours.** All the abjection and self-hatred** are designed, in the long run, solely for this end; unless they attain this end they do us little harm; and they may even do us good if they keep the man concerned with himself, and, above all, if self-contempt can be made the starting-point for contempt of other selves, and thus for gloom, cynicism, and cruelty.

You must therefore conceal from the patient the true end of Humility. Let him think of it not as self-forgetfulness but as a certain kind of opinion (namely, a low opinion) of his own talents and character. Some talents, I gather, he really has. Fix in his mind the idea that humility consists in trying to believe those talents to be less valuable than he believes them to be. No doubt they are in fact less valuable than he believes, but that is not the point. The great thing is to make him value an opinion for some quality other than truth, thus introducing an element of dishonesty and make-believe into the heart of what otherwise threatens to become a virtue. By this method thousands of humans have been brought to think that humility means pretty women trying to believe they are ugly and clever men trying to believe they are fools. And since what they are trying to believe may, in some cases, be manifest nonsense, they cannot succeed in believing it and we have the chance of keeping their minds endlessly revolving on themselves in an effort to achieve the impossible. To anticipate the Enemy’s strategy, we must consider His aims. The Enemy wants to bring the man to a state of mind in which he could design the best cathedral in the world, and know it to be the best, and rejoice in the, fact, without being any more (or less) or otherwise glad at having done it than he would be if it had been done by another. The Enemy wants him, in the end, to be so free from any bias in his own favour that he can rejoice in his own talents as frankly and gratefully as in his neighbour’s talents - or in a sunrise, an elephant, or a waterfall. He wants each man, in the long run, to be able to recognise all creatures (even himself) as glorious and excellent things. He wants to kill their animal self-love as soon as possible; but it is His long-term policy, I fear, to restore to them a new kind of self-love - a charity and gratitude for all selves, including their own; when they have really learned to love their neighbours as themselves, they will be allowed to love themselves as their neighbours. For we must never forget what is the most repellent and inexplicable trait in our Enemy; He really loves the hairless bipeds He has created and always gives back to them with His right hand what He has taken away with His left.

His whole effort, therefore, will be to get the man’s mind off the subject of his own value altogether. He would rather the man thought himself a great architect or a great poet and then forgot about it, than that he should spend much time and pains trying to think himself a bad one. Your efforts to instil either vainglory or false modesty into the patient will therefore be met from the Enemy’s side with the obvious reminder that a man is not usually called upon to have an opinion of his own talents at all, since he can very well go on improving them to the best of his ability without deciding on his own precise niche in the temple of Fame. You must try to exclude this reminder from the patient’s consciousness at all costs. The Enemy will also try to render real in the patient’s mind a doctrine which they all profess but find it difficult to bring home to their feelings - the doctrine that they did not create themselves, that their talents were given them, and that they might as well be proud of the colour of their hair. But always and by all methods the Enemy’s aim will be to get the patient’s mind off such questions, and yours will be to fix it on them.** Even of his sins the Enemy does not want him to think too much: once they are repented, the sooner the man turns his attention outward, the better the Enemy is pleased,** Your affectionate uncle

SCREWTAPE
 
LongingSoul,

“Would I be right to guess that you have experienced a cheating spouse and a subsequent divorce? I am very sorry if that is the case.”

No. I have been through a divorce (pre-Christian) but cheating wasn’t involved. What I said was referring to the fact that so much of the things we trust are in fact industries. I think if the two of them research together and discover this for themselves, that will help to bring them closer than counselling, which tends to focus on “the hurt” and not much else. Of course there is hurt, but I think that is much easier to accept knowing that it was demonic influence rather than something the husband did while fully cognizant of his actions. I don’t see this as making excuses for him, just dealing with reality.

Obviously the OP is free to disregard this.
 
Here is the thing: canon law is written under the assumption that once you decide to forgive, you are bound to do it. You can exercise the right to sever the common conjugal life if you are the innocent victim of adultery, but you have no right to yo-yo around with yes-you’re-forgiven-no-I-can’t-get-past this. Once you’ve given forgiveness, you are expected to follow through:

(Underline mine: )

*Can. 1151 Spouses have the duty and right to preserve conjugal living unless a legitimate cause excuses them.

Can. 1152 §1. Although it is earnestly recommended that a spouse, moved by Christian charity and concerned for the good of the family, not refuse forgiveness to an adulterous partner and not disrupt conjugal life, nevertheless, if the spouse did not condone the fault of the other expressly or tacitly, the spouse has the right to sever conjugal living unless the spouse consented to the adultery, gave cause for it, or also committed adultery.

**§2. **Tacit condonation exists if the innocent spouse has had marital relations voluntarily with the other spouse after having become certain of the adultery. It is presumed, moreover, if the spouse observed conjugal living for six months and did not make recourse to the ecclesiastical or civil authority.

…

**Can. 1155 *The innocent spouse laudably can readmit the other spouse to conjugal life; in this case the innocent spouse renounces the right to separate.
 
Easter Joy said: You can exercise the right to sever the common conjugal life if you are the innocent victim of adultery

What if HE is also innocent? In this case, there are serious mitigating circumstances and he has been victimised as well. Why encourage this line of thinking? Renwoman posted looking for help with her forgiveness and you seem to be encouraging a power play rather than finding ways for them to come together and win this battle.

For instance, if a wife is profligate with the money he earns, and has irresponsibly spent it on frivolous things, is the husband justified in severing financial relations with his wife for her sinful spending habits?

I’m of the opinion that vows for both conjugal matters and provisional matters must be honoured, and whether it be husband or wife using the ‘you done wrong’ hammer and asserting ultimate superiority is divisive and does not promote the longevity of a marriage. I don’t see what good it does to sever an integral and essential part of the marriage vow if marriage is for life. Moreover, you cannot sever part of a vow without abrogating the vow.

If she severs the conjugal life, is it going to make this more or less difficult? Does this path lead to a better marriage, or merely a grin-and-bear-it marriage? Will this make his struggle more or less difficult? Will this make her life better or worse?
 
Thag_Jones said:
Easter Joy said: You can exercise the right to sever the common conjugal life if you are the innocent victim of adultery

What if HE is also innocent? In this case, there are serious mitigating circumstances and he has been victimised as well. Why encourage this line of thinking? Renwoman posted looking for help with her forgiveness and you seem to be encouraging a power play rather than finding ways for them to come together and win this battle.

For instance, if a wife is profligate with the money he earns, and has irresponsibly spent it on frivolous things, is the husband justified in severing financial relations with his wife for her sinful spending habits?

I’m of the opinion that vows for both conjugal matters and provisional matters must be honoured, and whether it be husband or wife using the ‘you done wrong’ hammer and asserting ultimate superiority is divisive and does not promote the longevity of a marriage. I don’t see what good it does to sever an integral and essential part of the marriage vow if marriage is for life. Moreover, you cannot sever part of a vow without abrogating the vow.

If she severs the conjugal life, is it going to make this more or less difficult? Does this path lead to a better marriage, or merely a grin-and-bear-it marriage? Will this make his struggle more or less difficult? Will this make her life better or worse?
Click to expand...
I’m talking about canon law, not what one of us thinks “ought” to be a legitimate reason to sever the common conjugal life. Canon law recognizes that a spouse normally bound to the duty of the common conjugal life is not bound if, through no fault of his or her own, the person’s spouse is unfaithful with someone else. There is no concept of a no-fault infidelity, because it is not about blaming. It is about sharing the marital bed and the same household with a spouse who has been with someone other than you, who has had someone else in a place that is rightfully yours alone. Note: this is not grounds for annulment after the fact. This is a right to separate with the bond remaining. The wronged spouse does not get some ticket out of the marriage bond, but has relief from the otherwise binding moral duties of marriage.

That, however, was not the point of my post at all. I think you can see from my earlier posts that I think this marriage has an excellent chance of picking up the pieces and getting beyond this. I am very aware that the OP has no intention of severing the common conjugal life, and has said so. I think that is great.

My point, which is almost academic when it comes to the OP, is that once an innocent spouse readmits a spouse to the common conjugal life after an infidelity, the innocent spouse renounces the right to separate. There is no “you done wrong” hammer any more, once the innocent spouse elects not to exercise his or her right to separate with the bond remaining. The Church recognizes that this would not be fair to the spouse who committed the fidelity but was told by the wronged spouse that the bid of the unfaithful spouse for reconciliation was being accepted.

In other words, the Church strongly encourages an innocent spouse to re-admit a wayward spouse to the common conjugal life, but does so with this warning: Once you say, “you can come back,” you don’t get to change your mind and kick the “forgiven” spouse out again. You have to actually give the reconciliation you promised, because you have chosen to stay with your husband or wife by confirming that in spite of the violation of the marital bed you will accept the duties of marriage all over again.
 
EasterJoy said:
…once an innocent spouse readmits a spouse to the common conjugal life after an infidelity, the innocent spouse renounces the right to separate. There is no “you done wrong” hammer any more, once the innocent spouse elects not to exercise his or her right to separate with the bond remaining. The Church recognizes that this would not be fair to the spouse who committed the fidelity but was told by the wronged spouse that the bid of the unfaithful spouse for reconciliation was being accepted…
Click to expand...
Should (of course) read: who committed the infidelity

If a spouse who committed an infidelity is accepted for reconciliation does not commit another infidelity, the innocent spouse does not have grounds to separate any more. He or she gives up the right to separate by going back to living the common conjugal life. That is what I meant by not treating the spouse that committed the infidelity like a yo-yo. As hard as it is not to hold the infidelity over the head of the spouse that did it, a couple cannot hope for a true reconciliation without truly leaving the infidelity behind. I don’t mean expecting that the spouse that cheated once will be careful to be very open. I mean anything of the nature of a life sentence of “well, what about what* you *did to me?” Nobody can live like that.
 
Thank you all for posting. My relationship therapyst has backed up the fact that these meds can cause us to do crazy stuff. They can block our feelings. matter of fact this is what they are suppose to do. They block sadness and depression but they also block our Love and desire to be honest and loyal. These meds numb all emotions, they work differantly on differant people. My husband and I have had some serious discussions about how he was feeling then Vs now. He said that back then, he loved us all very much, but said he could not seem to feel it. He felt unloved himself. This is odd as we are a family that does most everything together. Our children have the " cool parents on the block" and all the teenage friends hang out with us. We have always been very connected soul mates…and my husband never went without " love" in the bedroom.
he also said the friend who was pushing this stuff …had been a for a few years leading up to this and he was always able to say how crazy this behaviour is and how risky and selfish it is. He was able to say " no this is wrong". Then the new meds came along ( not even sure why as my husband is not the type to take meds, but i guess his dr thought they could help him be less anxious in social environments?). Well he became less anxoius alright. he said after the meds came on, this hobby of his friends’ became more interesting and harder to resist. To the point where it was easy to not even feel his feeling for us. I could see the changes in him. and others could as well. His brother even commented on how strange and agressive he had been acting.
I am giving him this chance to fix all of this. He has no desire to see any of those friends, and is really quite angry with them for what they do and how they hurt others by glorifying a terrible thing. other guys in the group have fallen for it also and many have divorced.
I have to give him this chance because the meds were there and could have been a huge contributor.
Dr Breggin has some info out there about SSRI meds and how they can really mess people up. He has seen things like this happen all the time and does NOT prescribe these meds.
My faith has helped me with all of this as well.
Thank you all
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top