Wednesday night was when we had agreed to review the answers to the tasks at the end of the first chapter of the book we are reading together. We had agreed, after we had read the first chapter together, we would go away and do the answers to the questions separately and them come back and discuss them together. I have said in my previous post that the questions were taxing. There were 6 in total. At first glance I had thought perhaps this won’t be too bad, perhaps I will be able to come up with answers quite easily. I normally have quite a bit to say about most stuff. But when I got to actually sitting down and doing them I was flummoxed.
I didn’t really know how to start answering them. I thought I would type the questions out and hope the answers would flow. I did them while I was at work, on my work machine. All the data on there is stored to our central server so there was no way I could save the document to come back to (well unless I wanted all my work colleagues to be able to access the document if they chose to), it had to be a one shot attempt at getting something down on paper. I didn’t want to do them at home, I wanted a bit of space to them on my own. So early on Tuesday morning, before the rest of the office arrived, I tackled the list.
The first one asked whether we thought we actually saw the problem in the same way? This was followed by: have the arguments always been the same or is there a particular date when they started? Then came : what do you see and feel when you are arguing? Then there were a couple of questions about why you wanted to change and how do you envisage your life to be once you have made that change?
These made me stop and think. I did, after much thought and backwards and forwards deleting, manage to get three pages of stuff down to answer them. I re-read them before printing off and deleting the Word document.
Neither of us mentioned what we had agreed to do on Wednesday evening. We had supper together and then watched a little TV. Eventually, after the news had gone off my husband asked if we were ready to do ‘our work’. I have to admit I was half hoping he would have forgotten about it. This is perverse really as if he had forgotten I would have then stewed about it and used this as a stick to beat him with. How could he forget something so important? But I suppose a little (big) bit of me thought if he had forgotten and I said nothing this meant I would not have to deal with this and face the answers I had given and the answers he had come up with.
I don’t know why but it always feels awkward, a bit surreal when we try and do anything like this together. This is the first time we have read a book together, but we did try some relationship cards when we were in our false recovery period immediately after the second D Day. But I suppose they don’t count, they were during the lying phase. Perhaps it is a bit forced. Uncomfortable. But I think for me I was worried as this time I had not left anything out. I had not restricted what I had said for fear of upsetting him, for fear of sounding mean, for fear of him hearing something he didn’t like. I am fine at making lots of noise about his affair, his AP and all of that, but actually talking about how I feel about ‘it’ and other stuff, life outside of the affair – I don’t tend to go there. I have stuffed a lot of my feelings down, hoping they will go away. Avoidance, not a great tactic, but one I have used a lot to avoid having to confront, head on, the fear and pain I have felt. I commented on another bloggers post this morning that I don’t cry because I am afraid if I do I will never stop. It will be like some floodgate opening and I will be overwhelmed by the rush of emotions which will spill out. Blogging about it anonymously is one thing (I have dealt with some of my fears, feelings and emotions on these pages) but actually, in the flesh, in front of someone – that I have not been so good at. I realised I have even done this in a lot of our counselling sessions. I have wanted to maintain a front, not let anyone see the chinks in the front I have carefully put around me. My defense mechanism in full action. There is nothing to see here, all is fine – move along please.
But the answers I had given were a true picture of what is going on with me. How hurt and damaged I have been by the affair; how I have felt that I cannot carry on, that there is nothing to salvage. That sometimes I feel like a complete idiot for staying; that he had had his fun and got away with it; that by staying I have condoned his actions; that I was worth so little he could throw away our 15 years pre affair for something so meaningless. How I can swing from happiness to deep sadness with one little (or big) trigger, a word or a random thought which swerves in when I least want or expect it. How I can feel such rage, such a burning hatred. How I can think such horrible thoughts about his AP, wishing her such ill. How I can take glee from her misfortune.
How I feel scared, angry and sad – sometimes all at the same time. How when we argue and he walks away this just increases my rage level. How I feel he cries to make me stop (he knows I cannot stand to see him cry so this normally stops the worst of my raging). How I feel manipulated when he brings up the nice things we are doing (and this makes me feel like I am spoiling them by bringing up the affair again). How I so want to be able to go back two years. How I wish he had never been on that bloody course, never met her. All things which I know our counsellor would say would have made no difference, we were a vulnerable marriage and it was only a matter of time – if it had not been Bitch it would have been someone else. Well I know that – but I wish I didn’t have to be in counselling, that I wish I didn’t need to spend Wednesday evenings reading from a book because of some Bitch he happened to meet on a random Thursday evening and couldn’t keep his trousers on.
So it was honest. My husband had done his replies too. It was surprising how much stuff we actually agreed on. He had written he felt my anger, he knew he was the cause of that anger and he was sorry. He said he was scared, scared that he had damaged us too much, that I would decide I could no longer stay with him. That he had hurt us so badly there would be nothing left. That he could not envisage a future without me. That he wanted to grow old with me, he wanted to be there for me. He wanted to be married to me. He wanted me to be married to him, to love him. This is the first time my husband has ever said any of these things to me. I wish he could have remembered and realised those things before he got with his AP.
We worked through the questions together and, after some time, it didn’t feel awkward any more. It felt real, honest and I thought we achieved more in that hour of talking together than we have done for months. Perhaps because I let my guard down and let him see the real me under the wall I have built to protect myself. I am struggling to let that down, for fear of being hurt again, but perhaps that is the action I need to take.
At the end of our session we agreed to start the second chapter last night. To read until the next set of exercises and then revisit again next Wednesday evening. We didn’t quite get there. We had a row last night. It started out of nowhere, and was turning into something which could have got out of hand. But both of us made a concerted effort to implement some of the techniques we had discussed in chapter 1 and we largely succeeded. The book says it will take time and things might get worse before they get better (they can’t be much worse than they have been so I hope they don’t). But even if there is a 1% difference in each argument then eventually that 1% will get you to where you want to be. I think it was at least 1% better than our usual row pattern, so I am taking that as a good sign.
We are doing chapter 2 tonight. I hope the exercises on that one are easier than the first. But I am going with it, onwards and forwards. And I am chipping at those bricks in the wall.
survivingeventually2012 