We’re in Tokyo. Me, Blue Eyes, our two boys, and my parents, all here for the Princesse’s first birthday. I’m pretty sure my brother (GQ) and his wife are thrilled we have all come here for this great occasion as they are paranoid about taking their little girl on a plane. They’re not so much worried because they think she will get sick or her schedule will be altered too much, nope, pretty sure they are worried about her throwing a tantrum. This little girl is spoiled with a capital S. Adorably cute, and stubborn, and did I mention, precious? Eventually I hope they will get up the courage, because the whole family traveling here, often, is not really an option.
This past Sunday after everyone had arrived into town and we were all settled in our rental house in the Meguro district of Tokyo, we headed out to Ginza for a little shopping, sightseeing, and eating. After a lot of walking and a stroll through Hibiya Park, we headed to Rose Bakery in the Marunouchi district. Marunouchi is a beautiful little area of Tokyo very near Tokyo Station. Blue Eyes has stayed in Marunouchi nearly every time he has been to Japan over the past three decades, so many many times, including the three times he visited with the other woman. The area is a torturous trigger for me. When we were here in January, our hotel room had a view of the Marunouchi Hotel, a place they had spent nearly a week during their five years of traveling together. Of course I had booked the room, with thoughts of my husband’s comfort in mind. It ripped my heart out and made me sick to my stomach just looking at that building earlier this year. I kept thinking, am I looking right at the room where he betrayed me… where he disregarded me and everything about me in order to feed his selfish desires. Where he stole my heart, my soul, and my story away from me. I wrote some pretty tortured blog entries during that time. It was a purging of sorts. I felt better when it was all over.
There I stood at dusk on a warm November 1st Sunday in Tokyo, a mere two blocks from that hotel, with that same sick pit in my stomach. I left my family inside the bakery, finishing their coffee and pastries, for a bit of fresh air. Blue Eyes joined me. I couldn’t help but remind him of how difficult this whole situation is. Of where we were and of what he had done to me, my life. I didn’t cry, or become angry. I am merely tired and beaten down. I said I wanted to just scream at the top of my lungs how unfair life is. How unfair it is that I have been treated so poorly and now, I get to just pretend that my soul isn’t being ripped out of me again by a trigger of a memory of a time when my husband fucking broke my heart. There is nothing he can do for me now. Everything that needed to be said has been said. I know all the details I will ever need to know. I have cried way too many tears, they generally don’t help. He can only do what he does, stand with me, hold me, and tell me how sorry he is. It’s all there really is. Sometimes I feel like I merely exist now. I want to be able to go places and do things and not have the intrusion of thoughts of the bad acts of my husband. Even if he wasn’t with me, the pain of those memories would be.
We walked on. The moment passed. Nobody knew but me and Blue Eyes.
Today is the first day Blue Eyes is having to work. It’s a long one as he has taken the Shinkansen to Kyoto for the day and will not return until evening. I am not alone as I have the rest of the family with me and we will go sightseeing.
Blue Eyes sent me this message as he waited for his train:
As i sit here in the shinkansen station I just wanted to let you know how full my heart is with you and that I am never alone that you are here with me inside me all of me and how truly grateful I am to be with you and to share with you over these past days. Being with our family, having the boys with us here, seeing you in the company of your family and the love and baby lei lei in your arms is what gives me strength and is the life that I truly want. This is where I belong. I know that it could be gone at any moment. I know that everything is impermanent. I am grateful for every moment that I have with you and that you have chosen to still have me in your life.
Nothing taken for granted ever again.
Love with all my heart and soul.
I do love Japan and desperately wish my thoughts about it and my memories of it hadn’t been tarnished by the depraved acts of a very sick man.
There is not much else Blue Eyes can do or say. The sentiment he wrote above is very much appreciated. I wish it could wipe away all the pain. I think only time will numb it enough to allow me to feel that I have not compromised my life and my happiness for him. It is what it is, and today, I am just getting by.
try not to cry on my rainbow 
Damn CC,
You hit it… there isn’t anything else he can do but acknowledge it, is there? I am glad you are building new memories though and I look forward to doing the same at locations/cities now that I am out of crisis and trauma. I am so sorry he made the choices he made but I am glad he is there to bear witness to the pain that still resides and to appreciate you and your willingness to fight through all of the pain for your marriage. He is indeed a very lucky man.
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Yeah, nothing more he can do. It is so difficult to read blogs where the betrayed are still fighting with the mind movies and the daymares all the time and the really strong triggers, because I do know those fade, significantly, but they don’t go away completely. I am still hoping time continues to make it better. In the meantime, I get by by realizing this is my choice, to stay, to believe. I am making it based on what I know and I feel good about it. I don’t feel like I am compromising, but it is so far from what it used to be. Learning to live in my new reality is a daily struggle, but I’m doing it, and I’m okay. Thank you for your kind words. I believe you will be building those new memories very soon. Both our men are very very lucky! ❤
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I do not believe that once a cheater always a cheater. I think there are good people who make bad choices, feel true remorse, beg forgiveness and go on to rebuild happy marriages. I also believe sex addiction is real for some and they have a sad life ahead. I also believe there are a lot of common, ordinary, run of the mill, selfish cheaters. Thinking your husband falls into the latter group. The ugly skank was not a sex addiction, she was his other life. She blackmailed him into taking her to lunch, dinner, movie, business trips by threatening to reveal all to you……yet he deserted her for months on end and she never looked you up to share. He insisted, even though she didn’t want it, to go to YOUR home to watch a movie. Not to have sex in your bedroom but to share YOUR home for a fun movie. Seems he wanted her to be a part of his other life. Guessing that if you shared a sit down chat with the skank it would be interesting to see if he told you as many lies about her as he told her about you. You seem to really love BE and he so lucky to have you, but you really need to prepare yourself for when it happens again….and it will. You didn’t know for 15 years and you won’t the next time. Your husband eyefucked the woman sitting in the seat in front of you……WTH….. Words are cheap, actions telling. Protect your health by keeping up with STD checks (HPV). You are a loving wife and Mother who wants to keep her family together . Kudos for your effort. ……Sorry that your husband dumped this load of manure on you doorstep. The pain can take you to your knees, but what you do when you get up makes the difference.
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Thank you for your comment. I wish I knew more about you and where you are coming from in terms of sex addiction, cheating, etc… The thing I have learned from blogging is that we all have unique situations and no one can really know what goes on in another’s head, or the circumstances of their marriage. I blog out my story here, but it is purely my side, my story. My husband has his own story. I WAS sideswiped by the phone call from the “ugly skank.” I was confused and traumatized by the whole ordeal as the person the skank knew was just frankly not the person I had known for 30+ years. My husband had lied to himself, and me for 30 years, and he had cheated on me for 15, 8 of which were with this horrible woman. It was a not a romance or a love affair. It was sex. Someone he would not be seen with in public. Over 8 years they had lunch once, and dinner a handful of times in foreign countries. They saw one movie together because she demanded it. He met her inside the dark theater and left promptly after. He called her to get his fix, when he wanted it. She desperately tried for something more. It was never going to happen. He is ritualistic. He used her for his drug. He is a diagnosed sex addict. I appreciate your opinion, but at this point all that matters is what my husband believes and how he wants to behave going forward with his life. Regarding the plane, yeah, he eyefucked the woman in front of me. He IS A SEX ADDICT. They do that shit, until they get help, then they don’t do it anymore. For the longest time I did want to sit down with the skank and hear her side. That is not a good idea under the circumstances. She is irrational and potentially violent. He knew how to keep her fat mouth shut, until he didn’t want to do it anymore. He knew what was coming. He wanted out of his addiction. I do believe that because keeping his dirty secret hidden had to have been incredibly stressful. He picked a broken down person. She was manipulating him, but he was getting what he wanted. He was manipulating her, but she was getting what she thought she deserved… very little. She called, drunk, when she wasn’t getting what she wanted anymore. Regarding coming to our house for a movie, he had had his ritualistic sex with the old hoarder at her house. He wanted to leave. The only reason she had agreed to have dirty sex at her house was because he had promised more time with her because I was out of town. He figured an easy way to get rid of her was to bring her to my house, where she would be so incredibly uncomfortable that she wouldn’t want to be there. It worked. She became angry and demanded to be taken home. Our house is filled with me, my style, pictures of my children. Our house is beautiful. She lives in a run down neighborhood, in a run down house. She is a hoarder. What my husband did sickens me. My husband has now been immersed in sex addiction treatment and recovery work for more than a year and a half now and I have been bombarded with stories of the reality of this addiction. This is not something I ever wanted to know anything about. I could walk away tomorrow. I love my husband and I do believe in him. I do believe he wants to be a different person than the one that grew up in a home with abusive parents and learned to cope with life by using sex. That guy is slowly being replaced by a more honest and self aware individual. I do get tested regularly for STDs. I am not delusional. I’m up off my knees and feel pretty good about what I’m doing. The big lesson learned, I can live happily ever after without BE. Right now I also believe I can do that with him. Day by day is all I can do.
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I’ve been trying not to come back to this but annasnow your post incenses me. Have you ever been with a Sex Addict? Do you truly know anything academic and/or formal about the addiction? Your post tells me no so I question why you would even respond to a subject you obviously know nothing about. Your comment was completely negative and hurtful. Certainly not even constructive criticism or anything positive.
Crazy Kat: I admire what you (&BE) have done with what you have been handed. Your blog posts show progress on by both you and BE. The best we can hope for. My situation is quite similar and while I am/can be very sad about history he is doing all the right things to show us a good and happy future together.
Cheers to you for being big enough to respond kindly to the ignorant.
Hugs to you for your strength.
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Thank you, dontsay. I do believe it is difficult for people generally to understand and accept sex addiction. I am not sure why. When I first heard about Tiger Woods, I thought OMG, how awful for his wife, and for him. What is wrong with him? It must be the pressure from growing up the way he did, from everything he is and fame and what it takes to live like he does. He must use this type of sexual activity to cope with his stressful life. That was my instinct. My instinct was not that he was a loser. I did not know about sex addiction then, but I felt something was wrong with him, emotionally and that was just my opinion from what I heard in the press. I think it is nearly impossible for celebrity sex addicts to stay married once the tabloids get ahold of the story. It is just too humiliating for the wife. I’m sure being in that kind of limelight makes things so much worse. I don’t believe Tiger has ever come out and said he is a sex addict, although the rumors are he was treated. He could really educate the masses, but I get it. Saying you are a sex addict is humiliating and potentially a career killer. Just like with recovered alcoholics. Tell people you are a recovering alcoholic and try to get a job. People don’t get it, and they are afraid of addiction.
Regarding the above commenter, obviously she has some baggage or hate she is bringing here to my blog that does not allow her to be compassionate towards my husband, a person she does not even know except through my words. I do not believe I have misrepresented him terribly here and I have actually never received such a blatant denial of his sex addiction diagnosis. I have had people say they don’t believe in sex addiction and I get that. Sometimes you have to live with it to actually believe it. After the past 22 months, no one will ever be able to convince me that sex addiction is not real. But the above comment… it just seems cruel.
Thank you for the hugs… hugs are always helpful! ❤
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Your comments are ignorant, and very hurtful. Why post at all? Stay away from this beautiful blog and amazing woman- and keep your judgmental comments far away from this forum. This forum is about healing, and trying to find peace through commradery. Unless you have been in this horrific situation, married to your “best friend” for over 20 years, with children and a seemingly happy, thriving , and functional marriage, albeit a “facade”, you have no idea how hard you will end up fighting for your marriage. Inspite of the hell, trauma shock and awe of the situation. And if your lucky enough to survive, and have your husband in a committed recovery program – “ending it all” is rhetoric . It’s confusing, seeing this husband of yours on the couch with your beautiful and naive children , peacing together the pieces of your new reality. The reality of the dual life our husband’s lead. It’s been 7 months since d- day for me. Lots and lots of therapy for both of us. I get triggers hourly, and reading the above comments makes me want to keep a bubble around my family forever. Certainly not a heathy attitude for me to have- I am a secure, independent, strong and beautiful woman who could absolutely find someone new and parent on my own if I choose to end it all. I was blind sighted by this. However, my family survived a full term still-birth and a house fire (destroying all of our belongings and new home). I value my family unit. I am fighting for it. Inspite of the new pain. I would love to find a community and friendships supportive of me and my new reality . I am married to a sex addict. Desire does not fuel sex addict’s acting out with their partners; rather, it’s the highs of the “game” in an attempt to “feel” something and mask an underlying restlessness in their selves. Please, try to find your compassion for the betrayed. The unknowing spouses who must find the strength to hold it all together and find our smiles again. I am still trying to find mine. If you have something harsh to say, then please don’t say it on this blog.
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Thank you, Undone. I am sorry you are here because it means someone else is in pain and hurting and trying to make sense of something that many (dare I say most) people do not understand. However, I am glad you have joined this community because most of us here absolutely do understand what you are going through, especially wives of sex addicts. Yes, we all know we can walk away, but we have weighed our options carefully, and we continue to do so, for our safety, and for the safety of our children. Not knowing did not mean we were clueless or in denial, staying does not make us weak. It means we are strong, loving, caring human beings who are compassionate and kind and attempting to understand another person’s illness. It hurts. It all hurts. Thank you for being here and for supporting my blog. I would like to say that I hope you think of me as part of this loving, supportive and understanding community you seek. I do understand. I do know how painful it is. I do believe in the power of recovery. We are not ignorant fools, we are loving wives who care about the people we have chosen to spend our life with. Thank you for sharing today, I am thankful you did. xoxo
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Lovely, achingly familiar post, Kat. I am tossing around one idea for my thesis (or maybe for the directed study paper I do next year, prior to writing a thesis) being on places of loss – specifically infidelity – and the affective change that occurs to places that we once loved. I did a short piece last semester on how affect is changed for many people in certain previously positively associated places by acts of betrayal, and how we fight to not have them removed as positive places in our minds. It is quite fascinating to me – how our very mindful thoughts can be sabotaged by emotion…
I hope the moment passes, I know it will, but at the same time, it is with us forever. BE’s words were lovely, I know, “just” words, but words are important too – especially as he backs them up with his actions. (As an aside, how the hell did they think we would feel about all of this loss and betrayal????? An old question, and one that never seems to leave me…..)
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They didn’t think, the bastards! That’s why I think it must be a different process for women. I don’t know any women who wouldn’t ponder the emotional consequences of such betrayal. But perhaps I just surround myself with women like me. Women who would not knowingly inflict that pain, especially out of selfishness.
I would like to read your paper(s). The topic is so close to home, so very heartfelt and no doubt masterfully written. That feeling of being in a place that once felt so good, but now conjures deep pain. 😢
That moment passed rather quickly, however with every hour, I feel other thoughts invading. Mostly I try to shove the thoughts away. Not sure if that is a good thing. Where do they go? I know they’re not gone.
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Hehehe. Was just a final year essay on place and affect. Haven’t looked at it for a while. I never re-read them after seeing them marked.
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Ha ha. Doesn’t mean I don’t want to read it. 😜
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I feel your ache. I understand so well the feelings. Like being hit in the solar plexus. The triggers have such direct hits don’t they! You’re right there’s only sorry, sorry, sorry! Nothing more to be said. Husband was a fuckwit to risk so much and put you through this trauma. But everyday is a forward step. I wish you love and your right to redeem what is rightfully yours – a long term marriage
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Thank you, MR. The triggers do hurt. I remember a day when I was blissfully ignorant and went through each day seemingly without a care or a thought to whether my husband would lay down his life for me and our kids. I knew he would. He loved us more than anything and wouldn’t harm us in any way. Oops, I was wrong! It was all a facade. I don’t believe in that kind of love anymore, but I do believe I still have a companion I want to be with, and my dedication to our marriage and to the safety of my family hasn’t wavered. Someone had to keep their promises or the whole thing would surely have crumbled. He WAS such a fuckwit! Thank you so much for the wishes. We really need them don’t we. It takes a toll, being the one who consistently makes good choices despite the desire to run for the hills. ♥️
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I know what u mean when u say u don’t believe in that kind of love anymore. I’m the same. Something has broken which will never be fixed, and I wish it didn’t have to be this way, but it kind of taints everything. Words just become words, and you begin to question wether they have any real meaning behind them. Not just for the one who hurt me, but from any man.
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Yeah, that level of trust is gone forever. I hope we are stronger for it? ♥️
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One can hope, but the truth is it feels a little crap.
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I know, it does, doesn’t it. We deserved better. We deserve better.
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Absolutely ❤️
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Stay strong my lovely friend, focus on the blessings and look to the future. Enjoy this moment, the past is behind you. You are braver and stronger than u ever were. You can do this!
❤️C
P.s been to Rose Bakery in Paris, what a lovely place. Their cookbook was one of my favorites. It was called Breakfast, Lunch and Tea. It got left behind in my move to America. Great scone recipe!
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Our apartment in Le Marais was walking distance to the Rose Bakery with the pretty glass front. One of our favorite walks in the morning. Still want to go to the London locations! I’m doing much better than January! I can do this. ♥️
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How lovely! For me I always insisted on St Germain ❤️ near Pierre Herme of course lol
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You will have to replace that cookbook! Next week we are heading back to the hotel with the Pierre Herme in the lobby! 😋
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Oh do take loads of photos LOL! I will be glued to Instagram 💋
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We passed not one, but two Pierre Herme stores today on our walk… gotta love Japan!
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If u ever see something called the Ispahan croissant, I insist you try it. It’s what I want to eat on my deathbed LOL
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I’ll keep a lookout. 🌹
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I know so well what it is like to be haunted in places that should feel good…or at least normal. Some of it is from my own behavior, some from my ex. Either way, I have hope that time will heal me.
You sound SO much better than last year!
I am happy you are with your family and I am envious of your trip to Japan. Some day I plan to go there and reading your posts inspires me more!
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Japan is an amazing place! You must visit! I’ll do a fun travel post soon that doesn’t have heartache in it, because I do love this country, and yes, so much better than last time!
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