Then....Computers, Information, Disaster....Now...Empowerment!

For so long I have used my computer skills to gain information when needed, not only for myself but for my friends. When do you feel the need to search and look for what we already know to be true? When I found out about my husbands discretions, I went to work! I needed to know everything! I knew that he would lie because he had been doing it for so long it became second nature and I wasn't going to let him back in my house without knowing everything. So, I searched and I found. I made sure that I would never be in the dark again. I would never put my blinders on again and give him the trust that he so didn't deserve. But when we look, we find things that we never meant to find or wanted to know. I know in my case I would find pictures and stories about things he was doing with the other woman. And all it would do was infuriate me more and make me want to find ways to punish him for them. ANd what better way to do that but than to make it known that I knew and waited for him to lie again, causing him to be aggrivated and huff and puff. I mean why should I be the only one pissed and hurt, right? Wrong! It was a poor decision on my part because I was hurting myself more when I hurt him. Because despite everything he had done, I had still loved him and wanted to make things work. Then there was the whole sharing thing, I didn't want to share "my man" and that's what I was doing. I would have nightmares about him being with me and then being with her and then coming back to my bed at night! It was getting out of hand in my mind! I needed to seek help to let go. It took my two years to realize that I couldn't get passed it all on my own. Family and friends couldn't help me because they were to emotionally invested. I was in therapy for months but the reality was I wasn't ready and so whatever I was being told was going in one ear and out the other. For years, I needed the security of information. But was it really security? How secure can it have been when I was looking for the next wrong move he made or the next vindictive move she'd make. I was a glutton for punishment. And yet when the opportunity arose to be with him, I took it. I rationalized it with, if I do it with him its ok, he is still my husband and I don't have to look for it from someone else. I took sex or making love, very seriously. I still do. That intimate moment is something I don't want to share with just anyone. The vulnerability to be seen naked and not judged, the intimacy, the allowing your inhibitions to be let go...those things take great strength to look past. And though the flaws of my body are major to me, they seem to be miniscule to the eye of a man. Yet, I still find myself holding out for that special someone. In a way, its a great feeling because it reinstates that I still have morals and values. That I can look at my kids and feel like I am doing this the right way. I don't want my children to grow up and live this life or cause this life for the women they love! I continue to remind them that marriage is saced and that they should cherish the women in their lives. They have witnessed my pain firsthand, though I try to cry in private, my kids know my pain. I sit with them and talk about love and being good men. If they fail at everything else in life, they will alwas be successful when they remember who they arer and what their mother taught them about family. They will succeed in their marriages and families. They will be the men that your daughters will fall in love with, marry and have families with. I promise to teach them, right from wrong. I promise to instill morals and values. This is a promise to my future daughters in law!