Affair Recovery

When I was a little girl I received a lot of forgiveness. Somehow at a young age I discovered that if I confessed what I had done wrong before I got caught, my parents were much less upset with me than if I waited to be discovered. So I told on myself often. After a while I began to do it more out of a desire to be free from the guilt than from a desire to receive a more lenient punishment. I really cannot begin to imagine how many times I went through the process of doing something wrong, feeling terrible, telling on myself, then being forgiven.

While I cannot count the number of times I received forgiveness, I can say for sure that it was enough, because when I found myself in the position of a betrayed spouse I was able to reach deep into my heart and find enough forgiveness...

I was 18 when I started college and began studying to be a respiratory therapist. I was a young 18. I had lived a very purposefully sheltered life as a home-schooled girl, so there were a lot of thoughts and ideas that I ran across while in college that I had never heard while growing up.

I will never forget the first day I was in a clinical rotation at one of the local hospitals. About half way through the day I turned to the therapist who had been assigned to mentor me and said, “This is a great day!” She gave me a look of sheer horror and said, “What are you doing to me? Don’t you know not to say that? Quick! Knock on wood!” At my look of confusion she followed it up with, “And don’t say it is quiet either. All hell will break loose.” I soon discovered that just about...

About two years into our marriage Wayne’s papa passed away. I will never forget going to his memorial service. After parking near the cemetery, we met his mom and grandma at their car and walked the rest of the way to the grave site with them. I remember the surprise I felt to see his grandma there since his papa had divorced her about 50 years before he had died. As we got closer to the tent where everyone was gathering, she began to get visibly uncomfortable. When we finally reached the small crowd she quietly announced that she wanted to stand in the back and urged the rest of us to sit in the seats that had been reserved for family to sit in. I had only met his papa once, but had spent quite a bit of time with his grandma, so I felt drawn to stay with her rather than follow Wayne...

I have previously shared how I chose to forgive Wayne out of a desire to protect my heart from the burden that unforgiveness brings. While deciding whether or not to forgive him, I sensed that withholding forgiveness was somehow very dangerous for me, so I chose to forgive. As easy as the words ‘I chose to forgive’ may sound, believe me, it was not at all easy. It was incredibly hard. Having said that though, I can now look back and see that as hard as it was, choosing to forgive my husband was not the hardest choice I had to make in the area of forgiveness. Oddly enough, it took more time and effort to forgive Wayne’s dad than it did to forgive Wayne himself. Forgiving his dad for the choices he had made during Wayne’s childhood, and the way they had affected both Wayne and our family...

I think it was the night after I had discovered Wayne’s betrayal that he asked to meet with me so we could talk. He said he had some things that he wanted to tell me in person. Hoping to get an answer to my biggest question -“why”- I agreed to meet with him. I did not get the answer to my question that night, but what I did get was more pieces to the puzzle. He told me how he had begun to act out sexually when he was 12, then filled in some details from that time to the present. There was a long silence that followed his revelation. As I was trying to make sense of everything that I had just learned he said, “I am so sorry. I know you will never be able to forgive me.”

Honestly, until he brought it up, the question of forgiveness had not entered my mind. I was in a state of...

I have stared at the computer screen several minutes after writing the title, trying to think of the best way to approach this subject. After our period of separation, I remember the process of going back to being physically intimate was complicated and difficult for me. So many conflicting emotions. So many hopes, so many fears. Looking back, it occurs to me that the Keeper of my heart must have poured a double portion of protection over me as I waded into these deep waters. After being wounded my heart was extra sensitive, so it was easy for even a well-meaning friend to say something that would cause more harm than help. Thankfully though, healing words were also spoken to me during this part of my journey, so I was protected from any long-term issues that may have risen up from the...

First off, I feel like I should clarify this by reminding everyone that I am not an expert on marriage. I am simply a girl who has been hurt by the man I love, and has been through the grief and healing process. By no means am I in any position to give advice on when one should stay or leave. All I can tell you is my experience and what I learned from it.

My first reaction when I found evidence of Wayne’s secret life was shock. I remember the room went black and I had trouble breathing. After about an hour of staring at the wall and gasping for breath, I had only one clear thought in my head - that I could not stay in the same house as my husband any longer. I remember being scared out of my ever-lovin’ mind because suddenly it became clear to me that the man I thought I was...

When I first discovered my husband Wayne’s infidelities the first question I asked was “Why?” Why did he do this? Was it something lacking in me? What did they have that I didn’t? Why did he choose them over me? These torturous questions ran through my mind like a CD in the ‘repeat’ mode.

The friend who had been with me when I broke into Wayne’s email and discovered his secret life begged me to call the girl with whom he had been having an emotional affair. She thought that if we talked to his affair partner we would get the real story, or maybe even tell her that he was married and beg her to leave him alone. Had she been the only one with whom he had been unfaithful, I may have been tempted to think that my problem was with her. But during the week that followed my discovery...

Why do spouses cheat? As I said in part one, this question became a big deal for me during the immediate aftermath that followed the discovery of my husband Wayne’s secret life. While it was important for me to realize I had made agreements with false ideas as to why a person cheats, it was also equally important for me to learn the real reasons why this occurs, and ultimately why he had cheated on me.

My “ah-ha” moment came fairly early in counseling when Wayne began to describe his life as it was when he was eleven years old. His parents were emotionally detached from him because they were dealing with the broken pieces of their own relationship after his Mom had caught his Dad with another woman. Wayne was basically sent outside early in the morning and told not to return...

When I was a little girl I began what was to become a life-long love for allegories. I loved reading stories that let me discover the story behind the story. One of my favorites was entitled Tales of the Kingdom. In a nutshell, it is about an enchanter that ruled over a city where he made everyone sleep in the day and work at night because he was jealous of the light that the sun gave off. The people who lived in his city felt hopeless. There were a few people though who remembered the good, kind King who had ruled the city before it was put under the enchanter’s spell. They would quietly tell their friends that the King was now living in the forest outside the city, and that if they dared to escape the enchanter they could go there to live in freedom with him. The enchanter had...

During my healing process that followed the discovery of my husband’s betrayal, there were several things that he did to help make me feel safer in my relationship with him. I shared these things in part one. Today, I want to share the changes that took place in my own heart that allowed me to reopen it to him.

The main thing that stands out in my mind when I look back on that time is where I chose to put my focus. During the eight years of our marriage before discovery, I assumed that nothing hurtful would ever occur in our relationship simply because in my mind ‘Wayne would never do anything to hurt me.’ So what did I have to worry about? I trusted him.

After I found evidence of his betrayal I was not only deeply hurt by his actions, but also had lost all trust in him...

I cannot think of much that will break down communication quicker than losing trust. When I first learned of Wayne’s secret life our conversations got a little ‘strained,’ to put it lightly. One minute I didn’t want to talk to him at all. The next I had a half a dozen questions that I wanted answers to. During the first month or so of our separation he would send me a text at night that would say something like, ‘If you want to talk tonight, call me. Otherwise goodnight.’ I appreciated this because it let me know that he was open to talking, but not being pushy about it. This left me free to talk or not, depending on where I was emotionally.

After we were a couple of months into recovery I began to worry about him relapsing into his old lifestyle. When I would ask him how he...

Have you ever met someone who knows the best way to do everything? You know, the person who has seen it all and done it all, and has now become the self-proclaimed expert. Yeah, I thought so. We all know someone who meets this description.

Unfortunately, it’s when we need them the very least they seem to jump out of nowhere and attack. It certainly felt that way to me. Wayne and I were very open with our friends and family about what was going on in our lives. The double-edged sword that we held by being so open was that while we received an amazing amount of love and support, we also received an amazing amount of unsolicited advice. It felt like everyone and their dog knew what I should do. And, amazingly, each one had a different idea on what that was. It was all well-...

In my last entry I shared some of the blessings that I have discovered can only be found in grieving. Today I want to share some practical ways that I learned to grieve. The world around us doesn’t help us with this at all. We grow up hearing “Big girls (or boys) don’t cry.” So what do we do when life hands us pain? How does one properly mourn a deep heart wound?

Finding a few trusted people with whom I could be completely open and honest was very helpful. These were women who rejoiced with me when I had moments of hope and cried with me when I was sad.

Another thing that stands out to me as being particularly helpful was setting aside one day a week to grieve. At that point in our life both of our boys went to school Tuesday-Thursday. This was a huge blessing because I...