What Happens When the Unfaithful Spouse Tries to Rush Their Spouse to Heal?

Samuel discusses the struggle the betrayed spouse feels internally when rushed to heal or 'get over it.'

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Thank you..

Just what I needed to hear as the betrayed. We are coming up on a year in March of Dday, and I thought I should be further along. Sometimes, I just sit back and say, Because God Is Bigger, I will be ok again.

Healing roadblocks

Samuel, my husband did not ever explicitly say "when are you going to get over it?" But he did say many times over the past 3 1/2 yrs. since D day things like, "I just don't know that you will ever get past this. Or I'm just not sure we'll ever be able to put this behind us." Things like that, which make me feel that I wasn't healing fast enough for him. We did the EMS course on-line, which I credit for saving/keeping our marriage, we got an ok counselor who helped but after a year he retired, so we didn't have one for about 6 months and the recovery work was spotty. Husband did great for about 9 months after we got a new one doing the things I asked him to do to help me heal, but once things got better he just kind of stopped asking me how I was, if there was anything I needed to talk about, etc. I still think about it every day. I don't cry anymore, but I am frustrated about his lack of commitment to helping me heal. He wallowed for 2 yrs. about his poor choices. His shame made it impossible for him to do what I needed, I think and that makes me angry! Even now if we have any discussion about it, he cries and shuts down. He simply cannot talk about it unemotionally or he says something completely stupid that sounds like justifying. I feel mostly healed, but I have moments of major resentment towards him not just because of the affair, but because I feel he didn't do everything he could to help me. I did a lot of recovery work and healing on my own. I don't take it out on him, but I did try to talk to him 2 nights ago about it. I told him about my resentment at times, and he said he feels me being irritated with him over it. He knows I'm thinking about it, etc. I said, whoa don't go assuming you know what I'm thinking, because you don't. I just told you when I was feeling resentment and it's always when I'm alone in my car. At home, I don't get that way. I waited for an eternity for him to respond, but nothing. I rolled over and went to sleep. He left early the next morning on purpose. I'm baffled by his reaction after this much time since we had agreed to discuss everything good or bad going forward in our marriage. I don't know how to approach the subject now and I feel the distance again because I brought it up. I know he is deeply ashamed of his behavior and he still can't believe he did this for the many years that he did but now I think I'm the one asking, when are you going to get over yourself and move forward in recovery? Thank you for your blog, btw. It is very insightful into the unfailthful and helps me understand him better.

thank you for posting...

i'm so sorry for the pain you're in.  you are going through it for sure.  i admire your bravery to rise up and do recovery work even in those settings.  there has to be a point where he takes ownership of his own pain annd hurt and shame.  if he's the roadblock, he needs to take ownership of it and decide to get healthy or in this case probably better said healthier.  while you can't make him get healthy, you can encourage him to do his own recovery work and get better at communicating.  if he refuses you'll have to then decide how important it is to you.  you may have to draw a boundary and say if you don't do X then we can't Y anymore. whatever Y is for you.  but to allow him to continue to do what he's doing is concerning for sure and will delay your future recovery of joy and restoration.  i know it's hard and it's painful, but there is a way through.  maybe he can take hope for healing on the site? maybe some books.  what do you think?

 

What Happens When the Unfaithful Spouse Tries to Rush Their Spou

I also never came out and said get over it...do I wish she would...sure, but I never said that. I brought it up to my spouse and she said I was implying her to rush. I had to ask how. She stated when I ask "Why do we have to talk about the same thing again" I just think there are so many areas to talk about, so I can`t figure out why we need to cover a topic (or area) that we have already covered. My spouse even stated that I never said get over it. Even when I tried to explain what I said was just a question.

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I would highly recommend giving this a try.
 
-D, Texas