Sorry Before Breakfast

My regular morning routine today came with an additional eye opener, other than my Tazo Awake Tea.  Before breakfast, my brain got scrambled by an "I'm sorry".

Richard always leaves before me.  He keeps court schedules.  I keep retail hours.  I like my schedule better because I don't have to head out the door until 9:00.  His regular departure time is 7:00.  That was when he very unexpectedly gave voice to the words.

I walked from our bedroom, in my over sized white t-shirt that is my absolute favorite softie thing to sleep in, to the kitchen for a hug and a kiss and our regular daily good byes.  Usually we part ways right there when he heads into the garage.  Today, however, he had his arms full of files.  Lawyers LOVE lots of documents!!  He was trying unsuccessfully to balance his travel mug of tea on top of the file boxes.  Valiant effort was made, but it was clear two trips to the car would be required.  I grabbed the tottering tea and opened the door for him.  "I'll walk you out."

It was chilly out there, I was only wearing my baggie t-shirt and slippers, but that's not what woke me all the way up.  He put the boxes in his car and came back for his mug, which has pictures of us and the kiddos all over it.  I handed it over and he reached around me for a hug.  Then it happened.

"I'm sorry." He whispered in my ear.
I didn't process that.  I just muttered, "Huh?  For what?"
Where did that came from?  My gut even clenched for a second!  Shit!  What did he do now??

"I just wanted to say it.  I haven't said it for a while, so I wanted to say it.  I'm sorry for it all."
He said all that while walking to his car and climbing in the driver's seat for his 45 minute commute to work.
I, very eloquently replied, "Oh...OK.  Bye."

Then, I made a fresh, hot cup of tea, came back to my bedroom and decided to share this little moment out of my life post DDay with you.  
What just happened??  What was he thinking??  Why this morning?  

I ask you, my Sisters in Betrayal Survival....while we struggle to recover from infidelity, could it be our cheating husbands are struggling equally? Do they suffer with triggers?  Do we need to be alert for subtle hints that they need more reassurance from us?  Even when our lives seem to be sailing on calm waters, are there serious rip currents running just beneath the surface??  The emotional water of recovery runs deep for all of us.

Or...was it just a moment that I should appreciate as contrite confirmation of my husband's remorse and his sincere regret at past damage done?  Maybe I shouldn't over-think it.  Does it really matter that this apology, these spontaneous words of atonement came out of left field?
Perhaps I'll ponder it today, wait for thoughts from you and then talk to Richard about it tonight or over the weekend.

I might just let it go.  Not sure yet.  I gotta change my focus and get to work.
Regardless, this little eye opener managed to open my heart a little more.  Guess I'll focus on that for now.  Just another tiny step on my Road to Happy.
Have a wonderfully eye opening day, my friends!!  Hugs!

Freakin' Filthy Soul

The reply I received from Geek Boy Kevin, (Attention Haters:  I typed his name as a proper noun on purpose.  From here on in, that's just gonna be his name...his whole name...Geek Boy Kevin.  It makes me giggle and considering the subject matter, I think a few cheap grins, even though childish, when available, should be allowed.) instantly twisted my panties into an extremely tight bunch.

My response to him was without reasonable consideration.  It was enveloped in pure emotion.  I won't bore you with the entirety of the reply I sent him, but I can share the highlights.  I told him not to concern himself with my kids.  I told him his vague threat fell on deaf ears.  I challenged him to truly see Jaymie for who she was, what she'd done.   Lastly, I admitted that I realized I couldn't stop him from making a huge mistake by remaining with Jaymie, but I was hopeful his parents could.

That's right...I was planning on dragging more people into my circle of misery.

For anyone and everyone out there reading:  This blog is often very difficult to write.  As the story progresses, it is getting much harder for me to bare my soul, because as I share on my profile....my soul was freakin' filthy.  I harbor guilt because there is no excuse, not even betrayal, for much of what I did during that first year after DDay, especially adding to the collateral damage.  Perhaps Richard was deserving of my feeble attempts at payback, but Geek Boy Kevin's parents??  I think not, yet they weren't the last in the long line of casualties.
I did what I did.  I'm sorry for it today.  As my story gets even darker, I hope you'll find some wiggle room in your heart to forgive me my many transgressions as I continue to learn how to forgive myself.

I got one more reply from Geek Boy Kevin that basically said, "Jaymie is sincerely regretful.  Leave us alone!"  Apparently Jaymie had found another Knight to shield her from responsibility and consequences.
Always insisting on the last word, I sent Geek Boy Kevin this:

Your last email says it all..Leave "US" alone. You still have faith that Jaymie is worth your time.

Consider this:  You told me you had no idea about her relationship with my husband.  If you are that close, why didn't she share it with you? She went from Josh, to Richard, to you.  Not a lot of "alone" time.

She is very needy.  Perhaps you are, too. What do you think she would do if a man, like my husband, came back into her life?  A man that could give her money, buy her pretty things and take her to places she's never been.  She'd grab that guy like a drunk grabs his drink.  Think about it.

She sold you on her "sincere" regret, but she never bothered to share that with me.  So, forgive me if I don't buy it.

So sorry I couldn't get through to you.  You're young, but I think you  know that actions have consequences.

I'm going to copy these emails to your mom, then I'll have done all I can do.

Good luck.

By now, we were well into July, 2011, 9 months post DDay.  If I wasn't lashing out, I was sobbing into a pillow.  There wasn't even a pinch of progress in healing for the next few months.  I wasn't just stuck.  I was still sinking.  Hating myself for my inability to regain the "old" me.  Where had that strong, rational, problem solving, stoic woman gone?  I loathed this feeble, helpless persona.
Why wasn't I getting better??
When your wayward spouse is doing all he can to show true remorse, you'd think there would/should be at least a bit of movement toward the Road to Happy.  Not for me.  I told you, my soul was filthy.  With each act of vengeful defiance, it became dirtier still.  I wish I could find the words to tell you about the depth of my negativity and self destruction at that point.  I was the antithesis of motivated, positive, effective healing.
In the next few months, Jaymie, Daddy James and Geek Boy Kevin would come to view me as much more than a nuisance.  I assume they thought of me as a vindictive nut job.  Why wouldn't they?

My filthy soul was over flowing with hate.   I hated all of them.  I surely hated Richard, too.
But, by the end of that summer, I'd hate myself much more.
Truth was, I was scared shitless.  I understood I was fighting a loosing battle with myself.  I had brief moments of clarity.  Even though they were very few and far between, in those flashes of sensible thought, I knew one thing to be true....
I had become my own worst enemy.

Responding to the "Hit & Run"

On my last post, I received a comment suggesting that my blog is holding heavy on info about Jaymie and rather light on how I dealt with Richard.  Here's part of the comment:

 look towards the source of your anger. It wasn't just Jaymie- you can call her every name in the book- but your husband made a decision to cheat on you with her... you can blame her for the rest of your life, but that was HIS decision to make. He made the vows- NOT HER. So to behave like he was blameless is misplacing the blame-- but to dwell on her just tells me that you weren't secure in your relationship in the 1st place. If you were to ever heal from what HE did, you'd learn to let yourself heal from it and move on. But every post is dwelling on Jaymie... and I for the life of me, can't see where you're coming from and WHY you feel like you deserve her pound of flesh. 

It's a from an Anonymous writer.  I hate that!  If you wanna challenge me, don't run away.  Stick around and chat a while.  I welcome all opinions here.
Most that remark on my obsession with Jaymie or try to defend her in someway, don't comment more than once and I doubt they read my replies.
I call those comments "Hit & Runs".  Chicken-shits!

However, this particular Hit & Run gave me pause.  Not for the reasons detailed above, but for something else.  I feel I have been a bit remiss in sharing some very crucial pieces of my story.  You know about my obsession with the emails and the lengths I went to for satisfaction in that regard.  That means my story has centered around my dealings with Jaymie.

Shouldn't the story contain more on my relationship with Richard?  I don't mean "to dwell" on Jaymie, as the comment above suggests, believe me!  I really wanna forget all about that slutty bitch, but I can't write this damn story without talking about the scuzzy whore bag.  (plus, it's just so much fun calling her names!  Tee hee!) But...point taken... I guess I need to refocus for at least one post.  Once again, writing this blog has opened my eyes.  I have not revealed much of the trauma I suffered at home with Richard.  This blog needs some diversity.

Thanks to the little wake-up call from anonymous Hit & Run:
FOR TODAY...Jaymie  goes on hiatus.
I'm gonna tell you about how Richard and I were doing during the first half of 2011.  Let's call them...The Email Months.

Richard called himself my barometer.  The quality of his life depended solely on my mood du jour.  By April, 6 months post DDay, I had stabilized enough, in public at least, to function at work, keep my kids clothed and fed and maybe even socialize a bit.  My inner demons came out in the privacy of our home.  I guess you can imagine I was prone to frequent massive swings in my emotional state.  You know about the Roller Coaster from Hell.  I was still riding, but had been granted small breaks from the coaster courtesy of Lexapro.  I always thought mind meds kept you on an even keel.  That ain't necessarily so.  I had moments of relative calm, as I mentioned before, but when something, anything tripped a trigger....I was locked, loaded and on full automatic!  Poor Richard.

6 months post DDay is a weird time for betrayed spouses.  Many of us figured at 6 months out we should be getting over this shit storm.  Richard can attest to the fact that there is no 6 month expiration date on the pain caused by infidelity.  Nope.  Not even close.

Our relationship during the Email Months can only be described as volatile.  We experienced highs that would make the greatest of love stories on the big screen pale in comparison, like date nights filled with passionate kisses, deep eye gazing and words of eternal love.  We suffered through lows that required days of Richard behaving as contrite as an altar boy caught peeing in the holy water before I would allow him the pleasure of merely touching my arm.  Anything could be a catalyst to the low days.

Richard never had anyway to know which side of the bed I'd wake up on.  He used to tell me he didn't care about himself.  He prayed every night for me to be happy.  I believed he prayed for me to be happy, because then he got to be happy.  At that time, in my mind, the guy couldn't do anything right.  I was determined to be angry.  As I look back, I think the highs were my respite.  Mentally I couldn't maintain the anger.  I'm tellin' you, people!!  Anger on that beastly a scale takes a freakin' toll on you!  As hard as the Coaster was on me, it might have been even harder on Richard.  He craved the highs!  I teased him with the highs.  I allowed the highs from time to time only so I could snatch them away and torture him with yet another low.
In me, infidelity spawned evil personified.

That's about it.  That's why I haven't written a lot about Richard and I during the Email Months.  I sort of figured you wouldn't have to be the Amazing Kreskin to know what was happening in our unhappy home while I was visiting Crazy Town.  I guess I thought the obvious would be boring.

I can leave you with this little gem of a factoid....Richard knew exactly what I was doing.  He was completely aware I was trying to score the emails from Jaymie.  He cringed when I contacted Daddy James.  He also knew when I chose to involve new boyfriend, geek boy Kevin.  He was alerted to all of my Crazy Town behavior because I made sure he knew.  I was completely attentive to his reactions to my antics.  If he hated it, I doubled my efforts.  So, Anonymous Commenter, don't doubt for a New York nano-second that I was only about punishing Jaymie.  To this day, I am incredulous that Richard and I survived the Email Months.
I asked him why he stayed when I was so cruel for so long.
He said, "Because I made you that way and I'll be sorry forever."

Hope that cleared up your questions, Anonymous.
My next post will get right back to telling you about my response to geek boy Kevin and of course, bashing Jaymie!!  Whoo Hoo!