My grandfather was usually an easy going man, unless someone called him a “Son of a Bitch”. When those words were used, he became a fighter. Terms like those were ‘fighting words’. At one point he was chased out of the port city of Galveston, Texas for fighting too much. Since this was the time period of Jack Johnson and other notable fighters in Galveston, to be chased out of the city for fighting was a major deal.
I mention that in the context of affairs due to one of the secondary effects of affairs. When you have an affair, you may be turning your child into an “SOB” or making them a ‘bastard’ as a consequence of your actions or the actions of the cheater. When cheaters do their thing, they are often selfish and never or rarely consider how their actions impact their children. What they do impacts their children. It is hard to defend the honor of your mother or father when they have been sleeping around. Those passions stirred by ‘fighting words’ are often words associated with infidelity. There is a reason for those associations. Insults directed at your mother or father are often powerful. When parents have not been wholesome, it puts a burden over their children. They may defend your honor, yet they know that they have become an SOB, or its equivalent. Even though you never call them that, the actions of cheaters force it upon them.
The actions of the cheater and yourself do impact your children. Your unbridled passions may put things in motion that leave a scar across the hearts of your children.
Best Regards,
Jeff Murrah
3 Responses
Boy that is so true in terms of how uncomfortable the children of our marriage are ..but even moreso for the children my husband had with the OW …They question why he does not stay over night or live with their mother…and they know he is married and always has been .
My husband does his best to try to cause them not to feel ‘less than’ or have any stigma about the circumstances of their birth …but on some level that would seem to give tacit approval of adulterous or out of wedlock babies…which could become a problem for the teen girl soon ..since our society already has done little to discourage by stigma out of wedlock births.
No one want to ‘name call’ and do anything hurtful to children from adultery but you make a good point …society may not condemn adultery or fling aspersions on the ‘fruit’ but the people who ARE born of adultery still have to deal with it .
Our children too are shamed even though they have lived godly lives …not sinless of course but not intentional sinning …which as a follower of the Lord we make effort to avoid sin for many reasons …one being it is not LOVING toward others …and it is destructive and we want to honor the Lord ..being thankful for His gift of life and gift of eternal life as we came to know Him AS LORD>
Anyway …my husband is indeed caught between a rock and a hard place as he does not want those kids to feel they were not wanted….but even telling them they are ‘love children’ born of love is a LIE …since it is NOT LOVE to ‘do ill ‘ to one’s neighbor ..and he did ill to all concerned and so did the OW and they did it ON PURPOSE!
This is one “sticky wicket ‘ eh!
Recently I came to realize my husband’s “MO” is that he passes the buck…His choices are always because someone else ‘offered’ it …whether a trip, a game, a drink…or adultery ..He deflects responsibility for making a CHOICE by way of saying …it was the OW who ‘settled’ …or that he did not urge her to follow us through our many moves’ but informed her and left that decision up to her…..he also does this with invitations offered by other men to go do things…and after he accepts he says that ‘it is free …and he needs to go to get a rest’ .
This from all the effort he has made to ‘endure ‘ being in our marriage ..which only involves eating and sleeping upstairs …but for the most part he is gone to work, or working out .
I realize that his life has become a lot less exciting since he quit his adultery and playing golf ”as if that is his self imposed .punishment and now I should be impressed with how ‘good ‘ he is being
His actions are still reactive to all kinds of things EXCEPT to seek out how to live in marriage and do what it calls for.
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It is not WHAT he does when he goes to play ..it is HOW he sneakily informs me at the last minute that he is GOING TO GO …HE is still doing things the way he decides …and he has informed me that I should live my life….and leave him alone …he does not care about how his behavior impacts anyone …yet claims he wants the kids from adultery to know that he cares for them!
Some ‘caring’!
I have not heard the term ‘sticky wicket’ in some years. The dilemma faced by both the love child and the natural children are akin to dark clouds that they have hanging over them. No matter how may therapy groups or anti-bullying groups these kids attend, there will always be the scar of rejection. Therapy groups are not able to remove those scars. Sure they can help deal with them, but they do not remove them. The rejection is real. The pain is real. In each case, they have been rejected by their parent. The child knows they have been rejected and are viewed as ‘burdens’ to the cheater. These scars permanently distort the authority of that parent (e.g. they have lost the authority that comes from the parental role). The cheater is left with a few tough choices. They can buy some respect through gifts, they can become more demanding and essentially force their children to respect them, or they can reject the children further via neglect. Each option leads to further unpleasant choices. One bad choice often leads to more poor choices.
Thank you ….I wish this were common knowledge however it keeps being smoothed over by the more public ‘blended families’ which is one of the cultural realities that led my husband to think nothing of the way his choices and the screwy OW’s ‘rights’ would effect all of the children involved!
He thought our children would be able to help ‘raise’ those if he was found out and be ‘good influences’!
This shows how blind and ignorant these people were but both products of good universities…show effects of the government humanist indoctrination that is regarded as education …SO GLAD I HOME-SCHOOLED OURS!
There is no excuse for this kind of selfishness!