Hi DM,
A follow-up question for you. As a reference – I’m going through a divorce after my spouse entered into another affair (sex addict). During a support group, another person who had also experienced infidelity (who is still with their cheater) said, “This is going to scar you for the rest of your life. It is a weight you will always carry and it will always be there in your relationships. You will never fully get away from it.”
I had a bit of an allergic reaction. I don’t want to take on that weight or have that be spoken over me. Am I being naive? Am I just truly going to be broken and defined by this going forward? I want to believe God will redeem and restore me. But most of what I hear is about how your odds of divorce or getting cheated on again are higher the second time around, and that I’m just going to be miserable pining for my cheating ex-husband. I just don’t hear much encouragement – basically its, you ‘picked wrong’ the first time around so you’re busted and busted forever.
What are your thoughts – what is realistic here? I keep trying to tell myself this isn’t God punishing me.
Sincerely,
Nutella_4ever
Dear Nutella_4ever,
In your comment, you wrote,
During a support group, another person who had also experienced infidelity (who is still with their cheater) said, “This is going to scar you for the rest of your life. It is a weight you will always carry and it will always be there in your relationships. You will never fully get away from it.”
I agree and disagree with this person’s comment.
First, I agree we bear the scars of having married a cheater. It is a life experience that we survived. Hence, we have scars. I do not see scars in this sense as a bad thing.
However, I disagree with the second part of this person’s statement:
“It is a weight you will always carry and it will always be there in your relationships. You will never fully get away from it.”
Scars fade. This is true when it comes to the scars around infidelity trauma as well. In my experience, this is what I have felt regarding my first marriage and its ending via my ex-wife’s adultery.
A sign of healing from loss is a fading of the acute pain. Someone who still lives in this acute pain or is stuck forever with this weight is someone who has not done his or her grief work and may need professional help in working through it.
I am a trained clinical chaplain and someone who has expertise in bereavement support. So, I know what I am saying when I talk of grief and its relationships to a traumatic loss of a marriage via a partner’s infidelity.
Yes, you will be different after this traumatic loss. We all are different after a loss. That is normal and to be expected. It is healthy to change and learn from life experiences including this awful one.
What is abnormal is forever living in a state of unresolved grief over the lost marriage. You are not doomed forever to stuck in this state in my opinion.
Now, nearly a decade removed from my divorce, my ex-wife is merely a stranger or someone I once knew. Mrs. DM is very real to me, and our marriage hardly triggers my past in regards to my first marriage these days.
So, I guess what I am saying is that my experience is a counterexample to what the person shared with you. Plus, I am better positioned to talk about these matters as someone who did divorce my cheater and moved onto a successful second marriage.
Your write,
I had a bit of an allergic reaction. I don’t want to take on that weight or have that be spoken over me. Am I being naive? Am I just truly going to be broken and defined by this going forward?
No, I don’t think you are being naive. This will always be part of your story, but your story is more than this one chapter.
A godly and truly loving future spouse–if God so blesses you–will honor that. They will understand this is part of your story and express patient compassion towards you in respecting that.
Discovering marital infidelity and divorcing a cheater is similar to surviving other trauma. Those experiences are going to color your life. It doesn’t have to stop you from living, though. You can heal and survive it.
Only real, heartless jerks or relationship idiots will fail to respect your healing journey and traumatic life experiences. I wouldn’t recommend marrying either in those categories 😉
You wrote,
I want to believe God will redeem and restore me. But most of what I hear is about how your odds of divorce or getting cheated on again are higher the second time around, and that I’m just going to be miserable pining for my cheating ex-husband. I just don’t hear much encouragement – basically its, you ‘picked wrong’ the first time around so you’re busted and busted forever.
This is the language of those who prioritize marriage over the spiritual and emotional well-being of faithful spouses like yourself. Please do not give into their fear-mongering.
God tells us in 2 Timothy 1:7 (KJV):
For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.
I am disturbed by this advice that has been given to you. Godly people do not use the tools of fear to control people’s decisions. That is not how God works as this verse out of 2 Timothy 1 tells us.
Also, someone who tells you that you will forever pine after your abuser is someone who does not really care about you, in my opinion. A cheater is an abuser.
Yes, we may long after who we thought they were as part of our grief process; however, it is best to get away from such an abuser than continue to give him or her more opportunity to abuse us.
There is hope and abundant life after divorce. That is my experience. You are not forever doomed to abusive relationships.
Might you need to do some self-work in healing and figuring out how to pick a non-abuser? Sure. I think we all need help from time to time in our life’s journey. There is no shame in that. It does not make us “damaged goods.”
Rather, we show our wisdom, strength, and courage when we willing reach out for help as you are doing here by writing to me. Thank you for that!
You write,
I keep trying to tell myself this isn’t God punishing me.
God, who is my God, would never use adultery or marital infidelity to punish you. He condemns such as sin (see Exodus 20:14). God does not tempt us and is not the author of such wicked darkness as we know from James 1.
So, I would continue to encourage you to resist that lie from the pit of Hell. God is not doing this. A fallen man who sinned against you is. Sadly, we live in a world with such sin and brokenness. It hurts.
Yet I would say that there is hope. God is the master of taken our tears of mourning and transforming them into beauty as it says in Isaiah 61:3a (KJV):
To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness….
A hope-filled voice,
Pastor David (aka Divorce Minister)
