Trickle Truth

When I woke up on this day 2 years ago, I had no idea that my whole life and everything I knew and believed was about to change. I had no idea that by the end of the day, my entire world would be turned upside down. 

April 24, 2018, the events of this day still haunt me. I woke hopeful he had seemed a little more himself this week then he had the past few months. I thought we had finally come out the other side of whatever the heck was going on. He got up, headed to work, and I went about cleaning the house before leaving on a bus trip. We had shared a moment that morning when he arrived back home a few hours after he left. I didn’t know then what I do now that he was also with her that morning. It was a series of odd things he had met me at the bus to give me a bag that he needed me to take with me and he would Kiss me goodbye. I had no idea when I loaded that bus @10 am what would happen next. He messaged me on the trip, but by lunch, he wasn’t replying to anything I had sent. I coached that softball game messaging him when I had a moment still no reply after the game I called his phone and got a message stating the customer I dialed had restrictions. I had my child that was with my call, and she got the same message. I called my youngest and asked where’s dad he said he is busy. I said why won’t he answer me he said his phone is broke. Which I found weird as it was new. I said, will you have him call me? A phone call I would not receive.

 Then it happened a message on Facebook.

 I would silently cry tears the rest of the bus trip. I wasn’t prepared for what was awaiting me at home. 

All the Lies the deception. 

Sadness, anger, fear all of it had set in when I arrived back to my car @11:30 from that ball trip. 

When I arrived home, I noticed his work truck missing from the driveway. 

I walked into the house to see him sitting in his uniform against the bed with the lights on at midnight, and I knew something was really wrong. I walked in. I handed him my phone showed him the message, and he gave me back my phone and said, ya, I know I was put on leave because of it today.

I stood there in shock, devastated, and the words I dreaded knowing the answer to.

 Is it true?

He said none of it!

I said, then we fight!

I was willing to stand beside him like I had the last 25 years of life and fight with him for him. I didn’t sleep at all that night. We stayed up talking about our options what we would do going forward. I knew I had to go to work as I had things I had to take care of. To this day, I regret going.  

After I arrived that morning, I would receive a phone call that would again shatter any sense of hope I had.

I remember calling and telling him what was said between the husband of the girl and me. My exact words were I will help you hide the body, but you have got to start telling me the truth. I have to know what I am getting into. He again said it was all lies. 

That’s when it started the trickle truth. A change in the story over and over again. Trickle truth!

That is what I got. It won’t take a psychologist to understand that infidelity is damaging, damaging to kids, damaging to the family. He had watched the damage with his own eye when he and my friend decided to do this. He watched again as I would find out about A. When he had walked away last time. A lot of this damage was inflicted by the lies he told so he could cheat, sneak around for an affair. Lies, more lies, deceit.

Normalcy home, work-family, trips, love notes, like not a thing, was wrong. Like he didn’t have this giant secret in our marriage that I knew nothing about that he had not been lying to me for months. I had asked him to tell me the truth. On this day and so many other days.  The money he spent in someone else. 

risking my health

Downplaying the sexual and emotional nature of an affair, “we are just friend

Lies All the damn lies. I am leaving, I just need time. In the end that's precisely what he did, He left and never looked back after he promised me that we were okay and he would never leave, 

Justification

rationalization

history rewriting

I could go on and on with this list. 

The primary reason for a cheater not telling you about the affair is to protect the cheater from the consequences of their choices.

TRICKLE TRUTH. I would live this trickle truth from this day through August. 

The trickle truth I would hear from others, small pieces I would be given and told from others.

We had been through a lot in the past quarter-century, yes, 25 years. Did he really believe at this point that I was incapable of dealing with any significant issues that face the relationship? This was so demeaning, even if he thought it would protect me from the abuse he had made me live from his infidelity.

Spoiler Alert: The damage in cheating is not your spouse having sex on some secret meeting spot.  Not the fact that he skipped off into the sunset to be with this woman willing to insert herself into someone else’s marriage willingly. The real damage is what it took to create the environment that made this affair possible, manipulation, gaslighting, the destruction of your sense of reality, walking on eggshells because your spouse is unpredictable, irrational, distant, and making you feel like a crappy partner. Then he was risking my emotional and sexual health. 

All of this came from the person I trusted most in life, my best friend, my husband, my protector, my everything. 

It messes with your sense of self, your sense of worth. 

When he made this choice, yes, choice, to cheat, he made a choice to break every boundary we had put into place. He broke every promise he had made, he broke all the work I had done on myself, on love on trust. It’s not that I couldn’t handle the truth. It was that he had so little respect for me that he felt it didn’t deserve it. 

Salt in a wound of infidelity! 

He lead me to believe his false reality because he didn’t give me a choice in the decisions he was making. He got to make a choice to do it then wanted to control the consequences of it. Denying me the ability to make my own informed choice. 

I have struggled to make any choices going forward from this day; I have tried to listen to what the Lord has wanted me to do. I have cried more tears than I ever thought possible. Where love once brought joy, love brings sadness.

I have spent hundreds of dollars and a considerable amount of time in therapy, and I have to hold onto this.

 HOPE 

To all my fellow betrayed partners navigating this aftermath of infidelity. 

I hold onto hope that there is a way out of this darkness. Hope and knowledge that support is out there for this chaos and destruction. I hope that somehow someway I will survive, and do I even dare say it thrive once again. I know staying quite only protects one, but telling my story may help many and give them HOPE. 

Dark

As I slid from my bed, willing my lungs to breathe, trying to run from the pain. Before I knew it, the ground was before me, and it all went dark. The attacks haven’t happened for quite some time I had learned to control it; I had worked on it to prevent it from happening. Maybe it was that nightmare and my lungs trying to gain air, and I needed to breathe, but before I knew it, the ground came hard and fast. 

I tried to ignore it, but all of me knew what day today was the dream that I can’t escape, the one I can’t quite talk about, not even in therapy because it leaves me in a heap. When I look into his eyes, they are dead. My past and the future, I thought I would have, gone just like that...

His ability to make me feel beautiful, now I know that wasn’t just reserved for me; it was all a lie. The past that haunts me, that comment, “I faked it.”

I often felt like I was failing him and failing my kids. Failure because I couldn’t save him, us, a piece of me shattered because I had no idea I was the only one trying. The pieces of me that died and some I fear will stay dead. My husband was a part of me, and now it’s a void that can’t be filled. 

That trauma that creates bile to rise, a ringing in my ears, restrictions of my lungs, and that darkness. The thoughts that death would have been so much better than this. The thoughts and images tormented me and physically made me vomit. I turned on the shower, and I climb in. I know it’s dark and I am alone. 

Trauma is weird; it affects so much. 

In the beginning, the wailing that was coming from me—terrified me on more than one occasion, the tears that would leave me drained and my head pounding. The pain in my chest that wouldn’t go away. My lungs didn’t know how to take a deep breath. I knew as long I still cared, he could and would willingly hurt me. 

I couldn’t make my head, or my heart understand or let it be a reality. Therapy has taught me It’s going to take a long time to give him up, that man I loved, admired, and cherished. SOMEDAY I hope. 

The failure inside me that’s kicking and screaming. The daily battles I just wanted that feeling to disappear to go away, please go away, if only it would go away without me having to do any work. The many days my body may get up, but my soul and mind want to remain on that pillow under that blankets, I leave behind a piece of me there most days the damaged ones that need extra comfort. 

The hardest thing is when people smile, I either look away as fast as I can, or I don’t look at them at all. I often believe they can see my toxic thoughts or that idiot kicking and screaming for me to let her out. 

Could someone please explain to me so that my head and my heart could understand how and why did he do any of this. I am a mess on this day, and you know what not a single person could give me the answer that would soothe my soul. I knew what forever looked like and now I can’t see it I can’t feel it, FOREVER and ALWAYS words that mean nothing. In therapy, I often ask?  Tell me how he could look me in the eye and tell me he loved me, kissed me every day, and lie? Not just little lies complete and utterly devastating lies. The kind you couldn’t live with if you had told yourself. That answer hasn’t come. It was the lies that shattered me the most because I am split between the truth of my life and the lies. 

What was REAL?

The shower, what a magical place it is, catches all my tears. It’s the place where I let it all out, that failure kicking and screaming and convinces me nearly every day that death would have been so much better than this nightmare. 

The stabbing pain in my chest, the squeezing of my lungs, I can feel the pull of the darkness, and I have to will my lungs to breath because I know what happens next if they don’t. Darkness and It is now more of a dull ache but can still spill the pieces of my shattered heart.

Yes, I talk about the disaster inside my head to my therapist I don’t hold back, and neither does all the failure I see stacking up. Then it’s his words again. “You have succeeded just like you have made it know to others.”

Begging = FAILED yes people this happened not even a little proud of me. 

Loving = FAILED had I failed at this? Am I still asking myself this question?

Fasting/Praying for a Miracle = Failed was I doing it wrong? 

Eternal Marriage = Failed oh ya, and do I mention I am sealed to a man who walked away from it all, the questions of this that are so unsettling to my heart. 

 Trauma Therapy = Failing oh yes, did you know they have therapy for all my issues? 

EMDR= Failed, this is no joke. I felt like every emotion was tormenting me for a full month once a week I spent an hour sobbing my head off. I would leave feeling drained, and then the words that made me know I failed. I not sure how to help you. Let me refer you to a CSAT... I know this will happen again, and I tell you all I dread it. 

Suicide = Failed I was going to leave this one-off. Then I decided to leave it as to why keep hiding from the truth. 

Enough = Failed I still ask this question almost every therapy session, why wasn’t I enough, and I usually get the same answer.  But I keep asking it, hoping that it will sink in. 

Trusting = Failed Ya, I didn’t see it coming.

Strength = Failed I use to believe I could survive anything, and now I know that a trigger can drop me to my knees in an instant. 

Relationship = FAILED I tried to save it, but it wasn’t enough for him, never was! 

LETTING GO = FAIL FAILURE in a big way, and I actually can’t stand when people say this. Why? Let go of 25 years of your life. Choose all the things you can erase easily. Not so simple, is it?

MARRIAGE = Failed yep because the D-word is the devil. It’s a word I won’t use on anything. I can’t stand it. Never wanted it, but what choice do you have when your husband moved in with this girlfriend? 

Healing = Failing gosh, this is work, hard work, and its every day, did you know you get homework in therapy. Ya, and you have dailies. Yes, permission to talk to myself. Working wonders, as you can see. I blame this day, April 18. 

I have been MIA because it’s been hard with everything going on, and people keep saying let’s go back to normal; you all what is normal because I been searching for it for two years now. 

These are the words for two years succeed haven’t left my mouth. After that message, I let those words keep me up for days. So yes, failing again for allowing his words to make me feel like I was not making forward progress. Yep looks like I have “succeeded like I have made it know.” Today I let his voice remind me of all my failures; the devil knocks, and I listen to all the reason I have failed or am failing. Tears are flowing, and I failed at keeping the from falling once again. Just something else to add to the list of things I have failed in the last two years. Now I failed at sleep also, the rest my mind so desperately craves it’s the nightmare of that dream I can’t quite talk about. As I laid in the shower in the dark, quiet night, between the sobs, I hear his other words the not so cruel ones the words you didn’t deserve this...but I struggle to believe them also because which are real and which are fake. I just wanted to go to bed one night and wake up from this nightmare that shattered my amazing comfortable life. I cried myself to sleep last night, knowing what today wasn’t anymore. 

The failure that surrounds me, I don’t want this darkness I can see the light all around just out of my grasp, I can see the light shining, and I know I have made it too far to give up now. Too far to let that darkness slide back in and keep me stuck in fear. I knew that nightmare, and this day triggered this attack I just wasn’t prepared for it because I had fought long and hard to prevent the panic attack from occurring.

In the darkness that scary darkness I am reminded of all the light that surrounds me the many people that fill my life with light the ones that have been a source since day one and have let me borrow their light from time to time, they asked for nothing in return or the pieces of their light I stole. They are my light in the darkness; they are my reminder that the lord won’t let us stay dark forever. He gives us people to share the light. He is the light! That morning that I wrote that list of failures, you know what happened? The words were spoken as if the lord was kneeling next to me. MY CHILD, YOU HAVE ONLY FAILED WHEN YOU STOP TRYING. You are not alone! 

I knew I wasn’t and that I had not been alone through all the failures, or victory in the last two years, every tear and heartbreak and I often feel alone, but I knew he was never going to leave me alone even when I fail.  He is there; he is listening, and he loves you through all the failures.