Some of you have no problem confronting or addressing the affair with the cheater. In most cases, the sooner you confront it, the sooner you can move on with the healing.
The audience I want to focus on today are those of you who are paralyzed with fear and wanting to move past it. One of the big culprits behind emotional paralysis is fear.
The fear is especially intense when your relationship has a history of violence. Although some cheaters can be confronted, there are some that present problems.
Some cheaters are violent and vindictive.
Even in the case where they have tolerable moments, they may be surrounded by others who are violent and vindictive. Their family members or friends may do their dirty work for them.
When violence is used in dealing with problems, confronting the cheater is a dangerous proposition. When the cheater views you as their ‘property,’ or that ‘you belong to them’, it’s understandable that you would have some hesitation about confronting them.
So, the question arises, “How” can you deal with such a situation?
For your own mental health, you will need to acknowledge, if only to yourself that the affair is ‘wrong’. This can be as simple as repeating in your head “the affair is wrong” over and over.
This will help keep you from emotionally shattering in terms of thinking that you are the one who is crazy.
Realize that you are not crazy. When you are living in a crazy situation, all the rules change. What they say is ‘crazy’ is often sane and what they say is ‘sane’ is often crazy.
It sounds topsy-turvy because it is. All the morals and standards of decency are twisted around. When the cheater is the one defining sane and crazy, the situation is ‘out of control’.
Realize that when you’re forced to live in a crazy-making situation, it’s important remembering that the situation is crazy, not you. Remind yourself that the situation is what’s crazy rather than assuming that label for yourself.
You can start turning things around by finding a stable reference point and building on that.
You may find yourself desiring an escape into a fantasy world filled with butterflies and promises from a fairy tale. The current term for this is chasing after “rainbows and unicorns”.
You can find your way back to sanity, telling yourself the truth one item at a time. The more lies you tell yourself, the more out of control you’ll feel.
Telling yourself the truth along with rejecting the lies is a way of starting the up righting of the situation and turning your mind around. Besides telling yourself the truth, start accepting those truths rather than believing the lies that others have told you about yourself.
The more you reject the lies and begin living in the truth, the less control fear will have over you. The paralysis wears down one truth at a time.
A place where you can start talking about what you’re dealing with along with finding support and direction is the support community at Restored Lifestyle.
Best Regards,
Jeff
4 Responses
I think this idea of one truth at a time is a good way for us to deal since when D DAY hits many it is simply an out of the blue explosion of emotion and confusion.
It is so disruptive to our paradigm in how we would do things and how we have viewed our spouse with trust even when some ‘red flags’ were there that many would have thought would give all of it away to us those who are not IN the marriage may not realize the powerful way a lifetime with someone skilled at deceit would have created a ‘norm’ in terms of their behavior EVEN WITH the things we see listed AFTER THE FACT that should have been tell tales for us .
One of the things that has been pretty much acknowledged in some of the marriage recovery therapies for instance that is necessary for us to ‘move forward’ if not ‘move on’ Is for there to be transparency and disclosure from the CS.
It seems a good thing not to have ‘trickle truth’ or ongoing resistance to reveal all of what is necessary for the Betrayed to have so they may learn what they need , but anyone who has had a lengthy lifetime of successful deceiving is so deceived themselves they don’t have the skill or desire to reveal.
I think when the wounded spouse finds they must learn what they need by their own search and delving it is not as helpful. If the CS has not been willing to reveal it seems that they are still unworthy of trust and without trust there is little progress for either one.
To gain one truth about the adultery to digest would be fine …but often you don;’t get that ..then it seems that to tell yourself the truth in terms of what is available to you to do is also one of the hard parts.
For me the truth that is in Jesus Christ is both great and also difficult because as we begin to see life through the lens of the Lord we learn that much of what we always throught about everything is not as He sees it …including our own heart! Yet without addressing our ‘beams’ we are going to STILL be living in something of a lie…thus I believe that is why He has told us to be in His word daily to learn what is truth about all things AND how HE has provided for us despite the truth that we live IN the world but are not to be OF it .
Thus we learn what HIS area of responsiblities are and what ours are.
So often I find as I consider my life ..I have had that completely backwards! But God is faithful to work out all things when we are willing to pursue The Truth and then we may also learn how to endure in all other situations….this includes living with those who oppose themselves ,us and Jesus who is Lord of all …even those who do not acknowledge Him.
To make Him Lord over our own walk is an awesome thing but it also is something that we learn about more and more as we are willing to allow His Words to become our truth in living .
The CS who is not forthcoming is not someone we can trust and therefore until something changes for us in what we see them willing to do it is difficult to tell ourselves the truth of not just what they SAY but what they DO .
This can be a long hard wait but the meantime we may redeem the time as we continue in the walk which our Lord has told us will be resulting in causing us to be HIS disciples indeed.
THen whether our spouse decides to ‘come to himself ‘ and to ‘recover himself out of the hand of the enemy ‘ we will have had some strengthening and growing despite all of what we do not like but cannot change.
This is HARD in waiting but along with being frustrated about how little it seems we are able to do to make any change in the CS we will become equipped for the time when they may seek to repent and are ready to learn whatever we might have been taught from the Lord during that waiting time.
I have found it difficult to learn that I CANNOT make my husband change or want to change in any way that truly would equip HIM to be his own ‘watchman’ and guardian of his own heart ….anything less that WANTING to be accountable from within his own heart will only result in resentment and unstable changes which have come about from external pressures rather than internal working of the spirit of GOD through surrender to the Lord and knowledge of the Word . The desire for change is the beginning which the Bible tells us ‘the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge’
Indeed if a person does not care what GOD has said, why should they care what anyone else says? Unless they have some motive …which any other motive than to love GOD and others will have some mercenary or ulterior motive which is transitory at best and deceit at best for both the one who has made a false repentant reversal in their behavior but their heart has remained unchanged.
This truth about how repentance must be is hard to accept when you love your CS and come to see they are resistant to any changes that might be IMPOSED upon them rather than becoming what their sorrow has worked within toward genuine change from a broken heart and a contrite view of what their choices have wrought.
This is a very hard truth to learn ….yet….it is.
Happy Father’s Day Jeff!!
Zaza,
Thank you for the well wishes. It was very enjoyable. I hope that your husband had a happy father’s day as well. I am often off the computer on the weekends, so it takes me a while to respond.
Glad to hear your day was special. I think he did . He spent the day with our daughters . He behaves like he is a single father now . It is sad. It actually causes our daughters to feel badly since they realize he is distinctly avoiding doing anything to encourage me to feel he intends to be actively participating in marriage .
I am dealing with some health issues with my heart now. You know the way that heart break hurts? well it seems it also has a degenerative effect on the actual muscle of the heart as well….I am going in for some tests. Infidelity is not good for anyone’s health.Stress is a silent killer even though I have had to try to deal with it by faith over the years….Lengthy emotional hurt takes it’s toll no matter how much personal care one may engage in to keep on going.
Thank you for continuing to encourage and educate people who are in need of this material Jeff.