I Think My Husband Is Trying To Make Me Feel Sorry For Him After His Affair
By: Katie Lersch: It’s very common for the faithful spouse to feel as if the cheating spouse is trying to manipulate them after the affair has been discovered. Common manipulations are trying to make the faithful spouse feel guilty, responsible, or even pity.
Understandably, the faithful spouse is often reluctant to take any of this on. A wife might say: “when I first caught my husband cheating on me, he was angry. He acted as if I was the world’s biggest snoop and he accused me of seeing things that weren’t there. He tried to make me feel like I was paranoid, until I showed him indisputable proof of the affair and then he had no choice but to back down. I stood my ground with his anger and eventually, I guess he decided that anger was the wrong tactic to try with me. So now he has apparently moved onto pity. Now, he’s skulking around the house and when we talk about the affair, he starts to cry. He says he is a weak person who doesn’t deserve me. He says that he is fully aware that he has potentially ruined his life. He says that he is worried that he is going to lose everything and not have anyone. He asks me all of the time if I know how horribly he feels about himself and how much he loathes himself. I wonder if all of this is an act. And even if it isn’t, I wonder why he thinks that I should even care. He made his choice. And now I am supposed to feel sorry for him? He sure didn’t feel sorry for me when he was sleeping with someone else. I don’t feel any pity for him and when he tries to get me to feel this, I just feel more anger toward him. Does anyone feel pity for cheating husbands?”
Empathy (Not Pity) Can Happen Sometimes With A Lot Of Time And Healing: Well, I think that some wives eventually do come to feel some sort of understanding and empathy, even if you don’t define that as pity. And I think that the reason for this is that sometimes, the anger burns itself out after a while and you are able to see this a little more objectively. Once this happens, many wives do have to concede that their husband was struggling when he made the choice to have an affair.
You usually don’t see an otherwise faithful husband cheat when he is on top of the world without any problems. Instead, you see him cheat a time when he feels pretty badly about himself. He may have just suffered a loss like being let go from a job or dealing with a sick or dying family member. Or, he may just be struggling with the aging process or maintaining his self confidence in mid-life when things haven’t quite turned out like he has planned.
Are any of these things valid reasons to cheat? No, at least not in my opinion. No matter how bad things are for any of us, there is always a choice to be made. Husbands who cheat make a very unfortunate choice that can hurt a lot of people. And, even when they are struggling, they should take responsibility for the same because they are the person who set everything into motion.
But that doesn’t mean that we can’t sympathize with their struggles. They may have been struggling before the affair and now their problems are multiplied as the affair is found out and people are angry with and disappointed in them. Their troubles appear to only be multiplied.
You can feel sympathy and still make it clear to your husband that this sympathy doesn’t mean that he is off the hook. You might try: “I hear what you are saying. Things are a mess right now. And I am sorry that you are struggling. But that doesn’t mean that you don’t have to clean up the mess. I’m struggling, too. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to feel sorry for myself and not take any action. I will support you if you want to go and talk to someone about this, which I think is a good idea. I am behind your getting help to feel better and move past this. I don’t think that you are a bad person, but you did make a bad decision, for which we are both paying. Rather than feeling sorry for ourselves, why don’t we try to make this better? I’m not a therapist, so I’m limited to what I can do to help you, but I support you in seeing one.”
The Difference Between Empathy And Real Help: I think that this is an important distinction. We may well feel empathy with our husband and want to help him, but we often are not qualified to do it. Not only do most of us have no mental health background, but we do not have the objectivity to counsel him without thinking of the implications for us and our marriage. Sometimes, the kindest thing that we can do is to encourage him to talk to someone. And make sure that we do the same.
He is not the only one struggling. It often makes sense for both spouses to talk to someone. Two emotionally healthy people are going to deal with this much more effectively than two people who are struggling. Plus, it’s hard to feel any empathy for him when you are struggling yourself. That’s why there’s no shame in encouraging him to get his empathy from a trained professional, at least in the beginning. You are not responsible for providing it when you are struggling yourself.
I admit that I had absolutely no sympathy or pity for my husband. Now that time has passed, I can objectively see the contributing factors and things make a bit more sense. But I still believe that cheating is a choice. Empathy can be understandable and commendable. But that doesn’t mean that the person who cheated doesn’t need to take responsibility. You can read about my own journey on my blog at http://surviving-the-affair.com
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