Survivors' Blog

My emotional walls went up when his affair began, and had been reinforced from all the deception and mistrust. There was no easy way to sandblast them down; instead, they were chipped away as trust was built - trust in him and trust in myself. I didn’t trust myself anymore after having “allowed” everything that happened. I felt stupid and weak for not having done more to catch him in his lies, stop the affair, and protect myself. His repeated false reassurances (more on those later) only reinforced the walls. I felt very guilty about this for a long time. He demonstrated in many ways that he is now a very trustworthy man. So I shamed myself for not just dropping my defenses, but it didn't matter - I just couldn’t let him get too close. I was continually guarded, waiting for the next shoe to drop. If it took so long for him to admit the affair even happened, if I waited it out I might get more truth, right? My counselor helped me understand that my defenses were put in place at a time I needed them. They served a purpose and protected me, and I should not be mad at myself for doing what I needed to do. I should appreciate my gut response (that even now continues to remind me of potential danger), for protecting me when I needed it, but I also need to stop bashing myself for developing necessary and healthy defenses at a time when it was critically needed. Taking down those walls is hard and that is where I am now, but not blaming myself and feeling like a failure/loser/whatever for not easily dropping those defenses is crucial for my well-being. I don't do this well at all. The more I talk to my counselor, the more she normalizes me having a hard time letting the defenses go. Maybe that will help you; I don't know. We are all dealing with competing realities of betrayal recovery and trying to sort it all out on some level. “Honesty is the highest form of intimacy." ~Nicole LePera Why do they lie? So why do people lie? It isn’t always what it seems. Lying creates power and control over a situation. If I lie to you about something, you are unable to make an accurate assessment, so I am essentially controlling your reality. Yes, it is manipulative and hurtful, but it may not have the intentionality we might assign to it. It feels like my husband intentionally manipulated and controlled me to ensure the affair could continue uninterrupted. The lies and cover ups were deliberate ways to ensure I had no autonomy to make good decisions about our marriage or my own well being. He and his AP both had to know that, but it seemed that my life was not as important as their ability to maintain the freedom to continue the affair. After D-day when I presented my perceptions to my husband, he saw it very differently and said he was not intentionally manipulative like that. Yes, of course he was intentionally lying to protect his secret, but not with the conscious purpose of robbing me of freedom. He never thought it through that far. The lies were basically a response to each immediate threat of being found out. Just kicking that can down the road until another lie was needed to keep the cover up intact. People generally lie to avoid consequences. When they lie, it turns away the focus so they don't have to really face - and feel - what they're doing, and who they really are. It protects their image, not only to others, but to themselves. It is more than just wanting to deceive others, it's also about deceiving themselves. By keeping things hidden they don’t see the pain they are causing, so it’s easy to convince themselves they aren’t actually hurting anyone. Most unfaithful partners justify their behaviors to feel better about what they are doing. Often, they tell themselves they are lying to spare their partner from pain, so it is ok or even noble. Over time the behaviors become normalized and seem less harmful - it is no longer shocking to lie, so it gets easier and more routine. The reality, of course, is that deception is not about sparing the feelings of the betrayed partner, it is about avoiding consequences and controlling the situation. People cheating in their marriage also lie to avoid risking something they don’t want to lose. I found numerous examples to support the irony that they often lie because the marriage is important. It sounds crazy, but if they didn’t want to preserve the marriage, they would probably just openly admit the betrayal, leave, and move on. Right? There are exceptions, of course. There are people who have different motives and then there are actual sociopaths, but most who lie are doing so to avoid losing something they value - even though the actions they are taking certainly don’t convey value at all. From my perspective as a betrayed spouse, it certainly felt like my husband was willing to risk our marriage and family because it had no value, but he wasn’t. Ironically, he lied because he didn’t want to lose it. He didn’t want to change his “real” life for the AP; otherwise, he would have just gone ahead and done so. Thank you for reading Part 2. I hope this series has provided validation for the experience of the betrayed spouse and perspectives to consider about deceit. Last up is Part 3 where I will close out the series and discuss more of the distorted thinking that can perpetuate deception, as well as the echoes that can linger in the betrayed spouse as a result. Can We Believe Again? Part 1: Crying Wolf Can We Believe Again? Part 3: Maintaining Status Quo

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"The saddest thing about betrayal is that it never comes from your enemies, it comes from those you trust the most." ~Author Unknown You are probably familiar with the fable of the Boy Who Cried Wolf. The tale concerns a shepherd boy who intentionally and repeatedly fools villagers into believing a wolf is attacking the town's flock of sheep. He cries, “Wolf! Wolf!” to watch them all come running, but they arrive to find there is no wolf. He does this several times, and eventually, when an actual wolf appears, the boy calls for them in a panic. By this time the villagers no longer believe him so they don’t come, and the sheep are eaten by the wolf. After hearing the same phony claims again and again, no one believed the boy when he was finally telling the truth. He had knowingly told the same lie several times before, but it still seemed to come as a genuine surprise to him when the villagers didn’t believe him when the story he told was actually true. This fable speaks to the complicated and frustrating experience for both spouses after the discovery of betrayal. For the unfaithful spouse, he or she KNOWS when they ARE telling the truth and probably feels hurt and exasperated that they are doubted or continue to not be believed during the healing process. After all, they knew when they were lying, and they also know that now they’re actually telling the truth, so it should be enough, right? The betrayed spouse is understandably guarded after the revelation of infidelity, and speaking from my experience, I refused to be fooled again. So even if I really wanted to believe him, my gut reminded me of all the lies I had heard, and that he was not to be trusted. It’s a very difficult place to be for both parties, and it takes time and understanding to even begin to find some middle ground. Understanding why this is so hard was helpful for me to cut myself some slack for my unrelenting guardedness and skepticism. As always, my experience is mine, and does not represent all betrayed spouses or situations. It may not be relevant to everyone, but if it rings true for you, maybe you can find something that is helpful. My husband’s long term affair ended 10 years prior to his eventual admission. I had been asking him for years to tell me the truth, but he continued to lie to me over and over again. When I finally got the truth, it was a mix of feelings. I always knew in my heart he had an affair, but was still hoping I had been wrong. I fought an internal battle all those years to convince myself I was overreacting, and that I should believe him, since he had very convincingly told me dozens of times that I was just paranoid. But it turns out I was right the whole time. Once the truth was finally out on D-day, it was all out. To his credit, once he decided to confess he held nothing back, he told me some very hard truths, and did not try to justify his actions. However, in doing so, he seemed to feel I would just automatically believe everything he said now that he had finally decided to tell the truth. This was after intentionally lying to me for more than a decade - over half of our marriage at that point in time. After all, he knew he was finally telling the full truth. He knew he never intended to lie to me again, no matter the repercussions. But I had been on the receiving end of so many lies, for so many years. So now, I wanted to believe him; I really did, and sometimes I was able to, but some things were just a no-go for me. The ambivalence was intense, and there were elements about the affair and the affair partner (AP) that I just didn’t believe, no matter how many times he said it, and how emphatic he was. Too many lies for too long had made it hard to believe anything. It confused me because at my core, I really believed he was finally telling me the truth. So why did I still have doubts? He was hurt that I didn’t trust him. He is entitled to his feelings and I tried to empathize, but the reality was, I didn’t trust him because he had proven not to be trustworthy. So where do we go from here? I hope you will join me for Part 2 to continue the conversation about the impact of deception and why it is so hard to overcome. “If you tell the truth it becomes your past.If you tell a lie it becomes your future.” ~ Anne Bercht Can We Believe Again? Part 2: Reinforced Walls