SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Hello everyone,

Me (WW) and my husband (BH) have been about 1,5 years post DDay and things are still pretty rough (those who would like to see my story, I have made a relevant post in this forum section).

We have both tried IC but it almost drove us further apart, so we stopped. We have been since trying to manage our own healing using available resources (books, podcasts, videos, etc.) and are currently on MC (although it has not been helpful at all so far despite us trying a few different therapists up until now).

We are currently under EFT (emotionally focused therapy, NOT tapping) and during our last session our therapist had my BH tell me the things about the betrayal that hurt him and how I have made him feel and then she asked me to apologize to him and tell him how I feel for having hurt him this way.

During the past 1,5 year, both my BH and I have had endless talks on a daily basis about, among others, all the hurt, the feelings involved, so what she had asked us to do on that day were all things that have already been said and feelings that have already been felt on countless occasions.

After I finished telling my BH what our therapist had asked me to, she told me "thank you for holding his pain". That seemed pretty odd to me, since me sharing how I felt about the feelings he shared with me and the pain I've made him go through, felt extremely selfish and as if I was making it about me.

To me and my BH, expressing remorse and apologizing, even if it is really heartfelt and profound, doesn't feel merely enough to hold his pain, which is something I struggle with, as there are many times (far more than I would like to admit) when I don't know how to be there for him when he is in immense pain. That is something I told our therapist, asking her guidance for ways/tools to be able to truly hold the pain I have caused him (which, unfortunately we didnt have time to address in that session).

Now, it has really gotten me thinking and I would really appreciate your thoughts and insights about what "holding our BSs pain" means and how you managed to do it. I would also really appreciate any BSs replies to this post, sharing what the same thing means from their perspective and what they needed their WS to do to help them feel supported, not alone and that the pain was shared.

[This message edited by Mage at 8:09 PM, Monday, November 25th]

I think "holding his pain" may be real close to empathy. Someone deep study on empathy and you will be helped. One other suggestion based on the trouble you are having with counseling. Try Jake Porters couples centered recovery model.

I think this can only really be expressed by your betrayed husband, but I think it's really about consistency and being genuine. My ex never stopped cheating and while I thought she had, one thing I asked her to let go of which she never did was ego! You can't hold his pain in an honest way with the same ego that got you into this situation.

You can't hold his pain without consistency, because their is no trust. You have manipulated him - told him you loved him when you were unloving, told him you were honest when you weren't - if any of the old ways are still there - he probably won't believe your truly remorseful just manipulative things to get what you want.

I imagine what he really wants to know is that you love him unconditionally, that you truly hate what you did and are remorseful for it, that you've put in real work to change, put in real work to understand his pain.

If he has to keep telling you about his pain - then it's likely he doesn't feel seen, heard, or understood. If you get defensive during these conversations then he's not going to feel any of those things.

With patience, alot of love, and consistency I imagine it will help him turn a corner.

This may sound unfair but cheaters put countless hours of thought into creating and concealing their affair. It's consuming and many describe it as addictive. Most don't put that same effort into helping their spouse heal. I would imagine that if they did alot of betrayed spouses wouldn't keep yearing for their cheater to "get it". Does he truly feel like you get it?

Well said Fit43!!!

Hi Mage,

Have you ever had someone "hold your pain"? Have you had that experience?

My husband and I were not good with pain. When I was in pain, or sad, he thought it was a poor reflection on him as a husband and worked hard to make me happy again. I wasn't accustomed to experiencing pain, so I moved quickly away from it. So it wasn't in our repertoire.

The other night, we were talking about something that happened a long time ago. I had finished an advanced degree at a top notch college. I went to work using the degree and I HATED the job. Hated it. I wanted to quit after two months. I told him, and he said something like: society has invested a lot of resources in you, it would be irresponsible to quit. It was extremely hard to hear that I was disappointing to him (which is how I heard that) so I persisted for a much longer time than I should have.

When I remembered that episode from 25+ years ago, he listened calmly and said: that must have been terrible for you. You needed someone on your team, someone who believed in you no matter whether you stayed or not. I am so sorry. I will always be on your team.

I'm sure he had reasons for saying what he did which were not rooted in being mean to me. He was acting out of his own hurts. But he didn't make excuses or ask for me to understand him in that moment. It was my moment to be understood and cared for.

It felt SO good. I wasn't angry at him, I wasn't resentful, I just felt close to him. It made me want to do the same thing for him, when he needs it (I have done that before, but it made me resolve to look for opportunities even more actively).

If you have never had anyone "hold your pain", and if you are a wayward I imagine you probably haven't, because it is very protective against doing stupid things based on that pain, then I suggest you look into IC again, and have a safe space for your pain be a key goal.

Another example, not infidelity.

The son of a good friend of mine had a stroke when he was 4. It was a shock - he looked perfectly healthy. After several scary weeks in the PICU, he went to rehab, and he had a good (not great) recovery. He had another stroke when he was 8, this time a bad one. He was in the PICU and rehab for more than a year and was very disabled after that. At age 10, he had a stroke that killed him.

The grief my friend is experiencing is intense. A year later, it is still present in every moment of her life. When we are together, it comes like a wave, washes over her, she draws inward and howls. It's often followed by a secondary wave, which is her fear that she is a bad friend, too demanding, never giving, and that her friends will get sick of her.

Many friends do get sick of it and withdraw. They can't be around her pain. They want it to pass quickly, to say platitudes, for her to find religion or whatever, to talk about mundane things, or to keep it in the appropriate time and place. There are many ways to signal to someone directly or indirectly that you can't handle what they are experiencing.

I've often prayed to God that I would be able to use all of the skills and knowledge that I've acquired through infidelity to some good purpose (apart from my husband and family), and being present for her during her pain is one thing that has been positive. I know how to be with her, when to talk and when not to, not to signal discomfort when she is howling. Mostly I quietly pray. When she is coming out of it, I know how to talk to her about her other worries, point out to her that she asks about how I'm doing after she has processed a teaspoon from her mountain of pain, and thank her for letting me be a witness with her and giving me the opportunity to be with her. She knows about my infidelity and I tell her that I'm happy for the peaceful moments of life, but that being able to be with her during that time is a gift to me, not something I'm begrudgingly doing for her and waiting for it to end.

The analogy to infidelity is, of course, that I am the one who killed her child, and yet she wants me to comfort her.

When your husband has pain, he needs someone there to witness so he is not alone, and he needs to know that you will not try to divert, hurry, minimize, or otherwise manage him. You might find gratitude for the opportunity to simply be with him and patience to know that even though it doesn't look like it's helping him, it is. And you can be alert to things that he finds helpful. My friend worries that her son was afraid during the last moments of his life, because he knew what was happening to him and that it was bad. I've found things to say about that which she finds comforting (and I've learned through gentle trial and error what is not helpful). So I repeat those things, gently, and the repetition of those images and phrases can help her to replace her fearful ones. So you can be alert to the pieces of truth (it must be truth) that he finds helpful during those times, and never get tired of repeating it.

WoodThrush2, thank you for the suggestion! I will check it out!

As far as empathy is concerned, I have emotional empathy (feeling other peoples feelings as if they were your own), but I do lack quite a bit in cognitive empathy, which is to be able to connect the dots and figure out why the other person feels that way or what the may be thinking (in my BSs case of course I know why he feels that way) as well as be able to figure out some way to help/something helpful to say and this is where my mind goes blank. Cognitive empathy is one of the things I am working on because, thankfully, it can be trained.

Fit43 thank you for your insightful reply and the harsh truths!

I am really sorry you went through all that pain. I hope you managed to heal and find peace.

Unfortunately, I am guilty of being defensive a lot of the times up until recently but that did change after I realized that in those moments what I was doing was defending myself/being reactive instead of actively listening to him and that was causing my BS more hurt and pain.

I have infinite patience and love for him, but I guess I need to work on the consistency part a lot harder.

I am afraid he is not yet convinced that I get it, but besides what my BS has told me, I will use your replies as a guiding light to get to where I should be and be able to truly hold his pain in ways that are meaningful to him.

I'm glad to help. I hate infidelity but I am rooting for you two. I'm healing, I don't know what fully healed looks like but imagine I'll never be the same. This is good and bad. I'll never understand this mess, it will always leave me a bit perplexed.

Pippin, I can't thank you enough for both your posts! I am so sorry for what your friend is going through and I am glad she has someone like you by her side.

I have had people I thought were my "friends" leave because they couldn't deal with the pain I was going through about a year ago (at the time I going through major depression) and it absolutely sucks, but it is a great opportunity to see who deserves to be in your life and who doesn't.

The difference in how you felt from your partner's second answer could be felt even from reading your post. Such a major shift and I am glad he could do that for you.

I think I understand a bit better now.. Thank you!

[This message edited by Mage at 5:29 PM, Saturday, November 30th]

Rather than hold his pain, I suggest you take 'helping him release his pain' as your goal. You can hold him while he is in touch with his pain, if he wants that (ask him if he does, or offer to hold him), but held pain festers and grows.

You may have caused his pain, but it's in him. He's the only one who can let it go. Letting pain go is about feelings - short-lived (in terms of a life that lasts, one hopes, decades) physical sensations - not about forgetting or forgiving, which are thoughts. He has to release the grief, fear, shame, and anger that come with being betrayed. Releasing the feelings frees up energy needed to thrive.

IMO, you have your work to do. Your best bet is to change from cheater to good partner. Your H can support you, but you're the only one who can do this work.

For both of you, resistance to change can be a big obstacle, and you'll need to work through that resistance. It's not easy.

My reco is to focus on doing the healing work without regard to whether you stay together or not.

BS heals BS.
WS heals WS.
Together BS & WS heal/(re)build) the M, if that's what they want to do.

*****

How much of your A was due to a felt need for external validation? Remember: there isn't enough external validation available to fill up that hole inside. You both need to validate yourselves.

It took me a while to get back to doing that after d-day. At first I mistrusted my W's attempts to win me back, because my trust level was zero. The hole inside me was gigantic. As I healed, I realized my W genuinely loved me again, in a deeper way than before the A, but more important, I came to know I was lovable, loving, and capable whether she loved me or not.

Other people may describe the process in very different terms than I do, but the successful healers all say, in one way or another, that they figured out they did not need their partners. Those of us who wanted their healing WSes as their partners chose R.

That is a very interesting approach, sisoon.. I mean that holding his pain may even fester it and instead I may need to help him release it. Would you care to elaborate a bit more on what that looks like? I mean, since you have reconciled, if you have any real life examples you could share, I would really appreciate it.

I have no resistance to change, I long to change and I am not afraid of doing the hard work. Thankfully my BS sees that, although I still have a long way to go.

Unfortunately, you are right. Everything began from a need for validation and it is heart wrenching to realize the hole I had been having inside of me ever since I can remember myself, the "void" as I call it.. I couldn't agree more that this hole can only be filled by ourselves, and this is one of the things I am working very hard on. All these years I had subconsciously been asking from my BS to love me for the both of us, putting a huge burden on his shoulders.. That is unfair for any partner.. I have a lot of work still ahead of me but I know I will get there!