WE are 18 months past d-day and H has been in C for about 1 year w/ the same counselor.

The other day he informed me he is now realizing that he has been unhappy in our marriage for some years. A few of the reasons: I don't take care of the house, I am overweight and taking care of my mom on and off through our entire marriage took its toll on us. So he is not painted to be a total jerk, I will tell you that H took care of my mom just as much as I did. During the times of hospitalizations and when at home care was needed he NEVER waivered on his responsibilty.

BUT WTF

I can't even believe that his C has allowed him to cop to these being reasons for his unhappiness and his subsequent affair. I really believe he should be way past this point in IC. And he doesn't understand why I'm not happy that he is opening up to me!!!!

Please tell it to me straight, am I off base here?

>A few of the reasons: I don't take care of the house, I am overweight and taking care of my mom on and off through our entire marriage took its toll on us.

If you test his premise, then you might answer the question. By inference he's saying that he would be "happy in the marriage" if his wife was taking care of the house, slim", and didn't have problems such as sick parents. Now, if your husband earned a large salary, was buff and muscular and never asked you to lift a finger to "work in the relationship", would that bring you happiness?

I sincerely doubt it.

It could be that what your hearing is an excuse he has come up with for why he did what he did that avoids pinning the blame on himself. From what I've seen, couselors will sometimes allow their clients to do this. I don't know why, if it's a reflection of their incompetence or if they understand that it's a part of the process of healing. My wife also tried to place the blame for her actions elsewhere, including her circuimstances, me, the OM, her upbringing, her mother, etc.

Tom

Lisa,

The reasons you listed are the excuses that WS use to justify the A...My H used the weight issue, messy house too...but the man had ONS's when I was a size 8...so it wasn't my weight ...it was about him..Now I try to include him in my weigh loss programs...going for walks together..healthy eating,
My house is clean but not everything is in its place ...he is ADD so he needs everything to be organized...so I really try to be better organized, not always successful. Now he pitches in and helps me...

As my MC said I could be perfect, and H would still have cheated.

It takes time to get to the reasons why the A happened...why he made the choices he did...his childhood played a part in his decision...entitlement, seeing other co-workers having A's ( my H's co workers all picked up W in bars 36 -37 yrs ago during the time he had his first ONS)...then loneliness...self esteem, macho feeling...the age of forties...seeing the rest of his life, ...and.... getting old

There are lots of justifications. not sure that there will ever be a real reason why...but they all play into the decision.

The good thing I see is that your H did communicate his feeling to you trying to find a justification...he is slowly working on his reasons....it took my H a while to work on his reasons.


take care,

Pat

"Time is precious, but truth is more precious than time."

A man who loves you for YOU won't care whether you are a size 2 or a size 22. That is bull**** and I cannot believe his counsellor is letting him away with it either. He is either not repeating that to the counsellor, or he has a bad counsellor who is letting him cop out.

Frankly he has some downsides too........an ability to lie, deceive and cheat......alot worse than a weight problem from my perspective!

The only person that should have a problem with your weight is YOU. Nobody else has to carry it, nobody else has a right to tell you whether you are perfect or not. It isn't up to somebody else to judge you - even your husband. People who love us should love us for what we are, not what we look like.

K

I found counselling a bit of a problem and it relates to your point - I found it altogether too passive from the other side - I wanted someone to travel on the journey a bit with me - To empathise and offer care and feel how things were - In fact I wanted someone to share with who was there with me and prepared to learn with me too.  This is exactly why I ended up using a psychotherapist trained in such a method.  You have to find the right connection in counsellling or therapy and for me I needed someone who simply would not stop at some superficial "reasons" for things but wanted to go deep and not stop till some understanding had been reached about how I was living my life and how this worked with my WS and others round me.  Counselling and therapy to my mind is all about a journey inwards and it certainly does not end with simple "these are the reasons why I had an A" type of answers.  These are not answers, they are excuses as has been said.  And.. scarily I am finding my therapy journey is revealing to me much more of the pain and suffering we all feel and how we have much more to share and care for in each other than we have separation and blame to make.  To me the journey has been into greater love and understanding for everyone round me - including WS..

To be fair though, counselling and therapy do not make everything go away like a magic wand.. nothing can do this for us.  But it all does help us to grown and travel a path that enables us to be able to be happier.  I am a great believer in good therapy and good counselling. 

Finally, there is academic research to show that much success in counselling and therapy actually depends on the people going into it having a real intention to try to make it work - It is hard to make progress if the person in counselling does not really intend to be there, just as in a marriage.  But the attempt to get your spouse into useful counselling is in itself a good thing as you are perhaps dealing with his first line of self defence ie "I don't want to even look at all this".. To get him in there with the right attitude is, in itself, a breakthrough to healing.  There are other ways to achieve this breakthrough eg for many it comes from religious transformation too. 

may you be safe and well, contented and happy