R.A.D.I.C.A.L. Thoughts

My Life Partner


I feel so totally alone.

Who can understand this pain?

Who can understand the sense of agonizing disbelief

that my husband of 32 years would have so little care for me...

that he would have so little regard for my heart...

that he would have so little concern
about what this would do to me forever?

How is that possible?

Could I ever give my heart to a man like that again?

Could I ever feel safe with a man like that?

Could I ever entrust myself to a man who could do that for so long?

Who could look me in the eye
and lie
and betray my trust
with such selfish disregard ...
for so long?

Who could say to me,
“We could work this out
if you weren’t so unforgiving.”

And that very night
call her,
and kiss her,
and have her in his bed
in Room 120 at the Fairfield Inn.


The above is a poem I wrote during the time my then-husband was telling me that he was not seeing his girlfriend. We were trying (I thought) to work things out. He was supposed to be extricating himself from that relationship. I was working on rebuilding trust. But deep down, I knew that he had not given her up no matter what he said to the contrary. He kept telling me that our relationship was not working because of me. He said my inability to "let the past go" was what was keeping us from moving forward. What was really preventing any forward progress was the fact that he was still having not only an emotional relationship with another woman, but that he was still sleeping with her whenever he could. What still is amazing about my ex-husband is that he always tried to make his bad behavior my fault. In all my work with women in this situation, almost all of the husbands try to make the situation "our" fault somehow. Either we didn't really understand him; or we were unforgiving; or we were something or other. The problem was never that they were having an affair. The problem was never that they were making choices that made a real relationship for us impossible. I used to constantly try to "explain things" to my husband. I would say things like, "I am working on forgiveness but you must give up your relationship. I can't build trust if you are still sneaking around and lying and sleeping with someone else." As you probably know, "talking sense" to them is virtually impossible while they are in another relationship. Do what you know is right. He will make his own choices. The problem is his infidelity, not your response to it .... regardless of how much he tries to convince you otherwise.