Despite our best intentions to take a break from any "hard work" this last week, Anne and I found ourselves covering a lot of new ground. Wednesday, I received a note from a reader commenting on the "new info" included in Anne's letter to me. It was pointed out that new information can take a betrayed spouse right back to day one in some cases. I decided to share the note with Anne. I had been feeling that there were things she wasn't telling me. I could understand her hesitancy. We had barely survived what she HAD shared. The idea of sharing anything more had to be scary for her. She has been very open since her confession. Answering any question I asked, and working hard to ensure that she is an open book, but clearly there were things that I wasn't thinking to ask and she wasn't eager to share. I used the note to open a door for her. It gave her an invitation the share anything she hadn't shared before. She decided to make use of the opportunity, and I'm glad she did. Secrets are a heavy burden. I wanted to make her feel safe in laying those burdens down.
I took a fair amount of time before sending her "invitation". Was I really ready for what she might tell me? I had to be. I had to be ready to accept anything she might throw at me or this could backfire in a huge way. I sat and tried to imagine the very worst things she could tell me. Only when I was ready to hear the worst did I hit send on the e-mail I had written. What she did share, was pretty easy to deal with compared to what I had prepared myself to hear, but that didn't mean it was easy for Anne. She'd been living with the fear of me deciding this was all just too hard and leaving for some time. Every new detail she provided was terrifying to her.
I understand fear. My own fear had become all consuming prior to Anne's confession. It peaked on Thanksgiving Day. We were spending the day with her parents and extended family. I hadn't seen her for awhile, and went to look for her. I found her in the basement. She was obviously ok. She was better than ok. She was glowing. Her smile was radiant, her eyes were sparkling, and she was on the phone with Dick. I was trembling as I walked up the stairs. I had lost my wife. This relationship was clearly more important to her than me, her children, or any of her family. She was gone. It could only be a matter of time before she came to me and told me she was leaving. I remember standing at the top of the stairs clenching every muscle in my body to get myself under control. I forced a smile on my face and assured everyone that Anne was fine. I told them she had a friend going through a rough time, and that SHE needed Anne's help. When we got home that night, I was torn. Even as I packed my own bag to leave, I thought about calling her parents to tell them what was going on and that they needed to come and get her. I didn't do either. I was afraid to do anything. I couldn't do anything. I was too afraid. All I could do was sit and wait for Anne to come to me and tell me she was leaving. That is what I thought was happening Christmas night.
As I look back on things, I can see that fear has always been a factor for Anne and I. We've both been afraid to upset the other from our very beginning. I suppressed my fear and focused on just working harder at those things I thought would make Anne understand how I felt about her. She dealt with her fear by taking the things she was afraid to tell me to an old friend. Dick didn't mind hearing what Anne wanted from her husband. He was more than happy to not only listen, but to provide what she was asking for. Fear kept us from talking to each other. Fear kept me from leaving Thanksgiving night. The fact is that I should have left. Leaving would have told Anne what the price of her behavior was. It might very well have sent her running to Dick, but if there was anything left to save, she would have been in a position to see what she was risking. As it was, I told her by my inaction that she either wasn't doing anything wrong, or that I just didn't care enough to be bothered. Neither was true. The truth was that I was lying awake at night waiting for her to go to sleep so I could slip downstairs and cry. I was, of course, terrified of letting her see me cry.
As Anne and I have discussed things over the past few days, we have both realized that fear was the real problem in our relationship. It was at the core of everything. We have committed to never give in to our fear again. We have also begun working to make changes in ourselves that build a sense of security in the other. The fact is that we both taught each other that there we consequences to saying what we were feeling. It will take time to replace those lessons with new ones. We are working very hard on this.
I remember the period from Thanksgiving to Christmas as the worst and most painful period of my life. The news I received that night was just the final stab. In some ways, it was less painful than the weeks before had been. In other ways, it was able to eclipse those weeks in a way that almost let me forget them for a short time. Some have suggested that sharing all this could come back to bite Anne and I. So long as we learn from our mistakes, I'm pretty sure we can deal with anything. If anything I've written can save even one person from the pain we've experienced, it will be well worth the risk. We don't have any real expertise in making a marriage work. We do however; have a great deal of expertise in how to drive one off a cliff. If you are reading this, married, and finding yourself thinking that any of our issues are issues in your own relationship, I encourage you to engage a marriage counselor for help. Anne and I have begun this ourselves. We've been very lucky to have made so much progress on our own. We're not at all willing to risk our future on continued good luck. We're beginning to see a future that is not worth risking for anything.
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