Hi Sibyl,
I feel very lost. Within the past 4 years, I've moved to another state, lost my job, gotten married, cheated on my domineering husband, gotten immediately divorced due to the shame of my actions, started my own business, moved 4 times within this city, and had the misfortune to fall in love with a wonderful man who turned out to be an alcoholic.
First and foremost, I struggle with the cheating and divorce.
My husband was a great guy, but treated me very much like a mother, being bratty until I fed him and coddled him, and took care of him -- and at other times, he treated me like I was a child. After moving to his hometown, I made friends very slowly, but when I did, it upset him and he became jealous and would scorn me.. I felt trapped. I lost my job as an architect, and went to work as a hostess at two restaurants, at my husband's immediate urging. I also began working at starting my own business. I had no access to our checking account or shared car, and he was grumpy whenever I needed rides.
I just snapped at some point, and began drinking, partying and had decided it was worth it to let a predatory co-worker have his way and we began a sexual relationship. I've always been a good-hearted person, slightly bookish and nerdy, so when this co-worker cornered me at a work function and told me that I was beautiful, and sexy and basically proceeded to force himself on me, something in me felt amazing and energized, for once.
But it only made me ashamed of myself and unable to face my husband. I pulled away, sure that our marriage had crumbled because of me.
That became a turning point in my life. I ended the affair, moved out, got a new job, and ended up falling in love with a man that I felt immediately kindred to. During my marriage, I had this feeling that things were happening TO ME, rather than me being in control of my life. As soon as I made the decision to finally face what I had done, and began rebuilding my life, I felt for the first time in my life that I could see clearly what was important to me and how I had failed to have agency in my own life with my husband.
I remembered all the times when his dominant personality had prevailed, turning me into a submissive and scared person, at his mercy. I have never been a fighter, always sensitive to the needs and wants of others, and can easily see their perspective. However, this type of personality, without a sense of grounding in what I wanted, turned quickly into people pleasing, rather than being understanding. I was an easy victim who fed right into the types of emotional manipulation that people like this rely upon to keep others under their control. Being isolated from friends and family meant that I had fallen into the perfect situation for an emotionally abusive person to take hold of me. It's taken me a few years of therapy and personal growth to understand this, and my role in the situation. I vowed never to get into such a bad situation again.
Very shortly after leaving my husband, I met S, a very charming, handsome and successful entrepreneur. He was everything my ex-husband wasn't: fun, super sexy and totally energetic. Whereas my ex-husband never had many friends, S had a million. He was adventurous, loved my cooking, and we'd talk for hours about life, design, and literature. He felt like the adult I had been looking for.
We quickly moved in together, and began building a life of trust, health, adventure, and business-building. I had even quit my boring marketing job to begin my business full time, with S's new company as my largest client. Things felt like they were falling into place.
After two years of our life together, I found out that he had been cheating on me with roughly 5 other women. Of course I was devastated, but because I had committed similar acts of deception, and had known the healing effect forgiveness could provide, I decided to listen to him and give us a chance to reconcile.
That's when everything began to unravel.
It was right around this time I became aware of S's upbringing. He was one of 7 children in a fundamentalist Christian household, and was celibate until age 23. He had carried a Bible around with him every day, and was very fanatical about his religion. Until he decided that he didn't want that life anymore, choosing the opposite. He left the church, began drinking heavily, opened up a bar with his brother-in-law, and began sleeping with as many women as possible. He would start fights about anything that resembled family values, like having children, getting married, being faithful, creating a home, etc. Though, he also became extremely hard on women who might be like him, dating multiple guys, being expressive of their sexuality. On one hand, he wanted to be near these "slants" as he termed them, yet also hated them. I believe he also has a similar feeling about himself, which leads me to the drinking. I believe he has such internal conflict about how he lives his life, that drinking and girls ease that pain for him. From my experience as a cheater, the worst part is facing the other person that you hurt. There are a few ways to get around that. You find someone new, who has a good opinion of you, surround yourself with others who have low morals and wouldn't judge you anyway, and numb yourself with booze or drugs. I fell into the "new people" and "drinking" categories.
I've never written this story, and I apologize that it's so long. Basically, I learned from my own experience that people fall, they fail and deserve a chance to be forgiven. So I honored this decision and began to work with S to understand him and be there to help him get past this. I knew that forgiveness would have gone a long way for me.
Another reason that I'm attracted to S is that he is a creative, very successful entrepreneur. That's something about him that I wish for myself, to be as successful and well-respected. Being accepted by him somehow makes me feel less insecure about my own shortcomings, which stem from financial instability, building a small business, and taking responsibility for my life. I also love him, and we truly have a wonderful connection---or so I thought.
As soon as I discovered exactly what S had been hiding from me-- the girls, the drinking, the deception-- he was never the same. He turned from a loving and supportive partner into a combative, irrational, mean-spirited person. He began to blame me for "finding out" and for expecting too much from him. He cared less and less about falling short and hurting my feelings. I found out that he had been in an on-again off-again relationship for 8 years (which went on during an engagement to another woman, and during my relationship). I know all this yet, my main problem is giving up and moving on.
Our city is small enough that getting away from someone like this business-wise is extremely hard to do. My clients are linked to him and his to me. He constantly makes it seem, to these people, that we are a couple, or at the very least that we are on good terms. This is what I've termed "emotional-business abuse". He's mostly concerned with how the public sees him, because he runs 6 restaurants/bars and wants to be seen as a leader. He threatens that if I tell someone who he really is, that he'll destroy my business. He constantly tells me that he created my current success. He represents us as a couple to whoever it seems like it might be fitting to do so (without my consent and without me being there). Everyone loves him and is fooled by him. It's kind of a mess. And I end up feeling so overwhelmed and (again) not in control of my life. I didn't want this to happen, I wanted to build a life with S, and focus on doing good work and building a great business. It just seems that because he can't come to terms with who he is, and forgive himself, that he needs everyone to like him to combat the truth of his life.
I feel courageous for having gone through what I did, and to have emerged with a greater sense of who I am, but now I'm just baffled at how to create a life that I am happy with, because so much has been destroyed in the last few years.
The whole situation leaves me with these feelings:
1. Did I make a mistake leaving my husband? When it comes down to it, I would love a partner and a family and a home.
2. Why does someone like S have this power over me and why is it so hard to not equate my self worth with what he thinks of me?
3. How can I begin to feel happy again, to plan my life with excitement? Right now, I tend to feel like a failure.
4. How can I let this go and pursue a life that I love?
Thank you so much for reading all of this. Just writing it makes me seem like I'm spending too much of my time thinking about this. Please help me gain a new perspective on this situation.
Thank you,
Baffled
Dear Baffled,
You are in what I like to call a Patriarchal Shit Spiral. What I would really like to do is plunk you down in a feminist re-training program, where you are not allowed to date a man for at least a year, but I am not sure that exists.
The current man in your life is really no different from the last, he's just a bit more interesting. Both of them see women as objects to get what they want, rather than whole people.
I'm going to directly address your questions rather than speak overarchingly, since there is a lot here.
1. You did not make a mistake leaving your husband. Divorce is a two person endeavour, and there are very real reasons that you cheated on him and left him. You felt it was your only recourse to get out of a marriage in which you were completely stifled as a person. Could you have done it more gracefully? Perhaps. But you needed to get out of there, and sometimes the only way out is to implode it all from the inside.
2. S has power over you because of what you find attractive. In order to stop dating men like S, the co-worker, and your ex-husband, you are going to have to radically change your idea of what is "hot". You'll have to take back a lot of the power you've been giving to men to run your life, and make choices for yourself. It is extremely scary to do this at first, but in the end you'll find yourself wondering what you ever saw in those kinds of overpowering male personalities. I really want you to ask yourself some deep questions, about why you are attracted to these kinds of men, which I think would be best done with your therapist. Have you ever been into a person who wasn’t a domineering personality? How did that relationship go?
3. In order to feel happy again, you need to be free. You are completely bound up in the expectations other people have of you, particularly what the men in your life think of you. You need to get in touch with who you really are internally, rather than whether or not you are a success in your relationships, career, and life trajectory. I know you are reluctant to let go of S, because all you see down that path is loneliness and ruin, but believe me, this man is not as universally liked as he appears to be. You will have allies if you leave him, and you will rebuild both your business and your self-worth, on your own foundation, not someone else’s.
4. Self-forgiveness is tantamount to your ability to let go and build the life you want. In order to fully embrace that, you need to understand that your choices, and your subsequent shame about them, were a part of the patriarchal system designed to uphold the image of men as powerful beings that get to call the shots, and women as mercurial sprites who exist to support and serve them. It is a system that is hurting men as well as women, and you are seriously caught in its web right now. You’ve got to cut your way free, which will be painful, but incredibly worth it.
In closing, you are definitely not thinking about this too much. It is all you should be thinking about.
In Solidarity,
Sibyl