Rationalization 201

/ CrazyKat1963

In LaLa Land for business meetings with the coolest mouse ever!

Possibly been sticking my head where it doesn’t belong again, and getting my panties in a wad.

For those of us who have been in long term marriages, or intimate partnerships, we know it’s not all sweetness and light. It’s not all romance and sexy time. In fact, it’s mostly not about that at all. The strength of the relationship depends on honesty, integrity, compassion, compromise, and kindness. This would be a very heavily trafficked two way street. If one partner is doing all the heavy lifting, constantly compromising, the marriage may continue, but happiness will die. Many times the marriage eventually dies too. The issue is not with the “marriage,” it’s with one or both of the people in the marriage.

If a person isn’t able to be honest and kind with the partner they have shared decades with, the mother or father to their children, the person who was with them when money was tight, when intimacy was a chance meeting between feeding times, or a quick moment of bliss in the shower before racing off to the office, what is the likelihood this person will remain faithful, kind, loving, and honest to a secret lover, an affair partner, a sexual escapade. The excitement is in the chase. The reality is in the depth and breadth of lies told to get there.

Affairs are an illusion. They are bred out of weakness. There are all kinds of reasons given, of course, by both cheating parties as to how and why it happened, but none are legitimate if lies are involved. If an honest person doesn’t want to be with their spouse anymore, they leave. A dishonest person will tell any number of lies to get a fix. If a man truly wants to be with you, he will be, no lies needed. If he’s lying to his wife, he’s lying to you. Why would an affair partner think differently? If the spouse is so awful, why do they stay? If s/he “changed” why stay?

Here are a few lies told by my very own husband (it does seem like there is some kind of manual for this shit):

My wife doesn’t have sex with me. I don’t even think my wife loves me anymore. My wife is not nurturing. My wife thinks my sexual needs are unnatural. My wife is not interested in sex. My wife doesn’t give me any attention. We have a marriage of convenience. I stay mostly for the kids. I don’t want to break up my family.

And specific lies told to his affair partner to keep her attached by feeding into her emptiness:

You are beautiful. I love you. You have gorgeous blue eyes. You’re great in bed. You turn me on. I love being with you. This isn’t just about sex. I would spend more time with you if I could.

He also told her about his childhood, his life, our marriage, and our children… all to keep her on the hook and make her feel legitimately wanted and needed and loved. As Blue Eyes’ first therapist said after reading one of the cards she sent, “she thinks she’s your soulmate.”

The truth is, my husband never intended to leave me, but he lied overtly and by omission to keep this woman on the line for 8 years. Any person that would do that has something seriously wrong with them, and he definitely does. Any affair partner that would believe so many vacant promises while receiving very little in return, except a lot of monotonous sex, should probably seek a therapist.

Affairs aren’t sexy. They’re disgusting. I know, I know. Movies, books, TV, tabloids… all say differently. People who have affairs are attractive and desperately in love, blah, blah, blah. Affairs are wrong. No two ways about it.

He or she is not going to leave their spouse. And even if they do, get ready for lots of lies in your future, because your relationship was born out of a lie.

And for those who were cheated on and turn around and have an affair with a married person… why? You know it doesn’t feel good, why do that to someone else?

And for the love of all things good, stop believing “the wife” is a horrible person just because your married lover tells you so. How can you separate lie from truth when you are in a relationship with a cheater?

The other woman in my life called me because she was pissed off my husband ended “it” with her and she wanted me to be in agony. Based on correspondence she sent after the phone call, she was still very much in love with my husband and didn’t want any harm to come to him. But me, she wanted me to SUFFER. Go figure.

Rationalizing bad behavior is the death knell for integrity. Before we can have truly honest loving and committed relationships with others, we must have that brutally honest conversation with ourselves.

Peace out! ❤️

Oh, there is a Rationalization 101, it’s here

19 thoughts on “Rationalization 201”

  1. Ugh…the lies! So many that even Will couldn’t keep them straight. So weird now that he has committed to “scrupulous honesty.” I still question some of his words, but less so. Does that mean I am beginning to *gasp* trust!?!? 😳
    Thanks for another on the nose post, Kat! **hugs**

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    • I think with enough time they can build some kind of trust back. I do remind my husband, a lot, that I know who he really is, now. No point living inside that sick head anymore. Hiding doesn’t solve anything (and if he remembers clearly, that life was killing him).

      There’s also the piece that they can never hurt us in the same way again, so our reactions are different. Frankly I do get tired of even contemplating whether he’s lying… and a little part of me really doesn’t care. It is ultimately his downfall. The fear, for me, is gone.

      Big hugs back, sister warrior! ❤️

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      • Yeah…it was where all the “rich kids” went. You know…the kind of school where when the kids turned 16, their parents bought them a brand new BMW.
        Not my children. Loser wanted to buy them cars and ultimately did, but I insisted that he buy them a used one.
        I bought my own first car and had to borrow the hundred dollars down.
        His parents bought his little Triumph when he turned 14. ☹️

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        • 14??? What was the driving age back then??? 😉

          Same for us. Our kids went to a fancy private high school. I’m pretty sure we were “poor” when compared with many of those families. We never purchased our kids cars. Eventually we gave our old Prius to the older kid when he graduated college. He needed something reliable as he has purchased an old Chevy Chevette that was incredibly unreliable. Our younger one got the old Volvo. I purchased my first car when I was 17, a used Mercury Bobcat with a rainbow strip, lol. My car payment was $48 a month. I paid it off in two years. When I was 19 I traded that for a Toyota Celica. BE received a Honda Prelude for college. I never contemplated purchasing our kids cars at 16. But I was sure glad when I didn’t have to shlep them to school every morning!

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          • In South Carolina, you could get your license at 14. I didn’t get mine until I was 21 and that was only because I got caught test-driving the car I wanted to buy.
            It was a 1972 Ford Pinto and they had a “working girl special.” $100.00 down. My car payments were $69.97 a month and many months I survived on a pack of saltine crackers so I could make my car payment. The engine blew up before I had it a year. LOL

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            • Wow, 14! I think mine must have been a 76 bobcat (the mercury equivalent to the ford pinto!!!). I lived with my parents still, so lots of food. It wasn’t until college that I struggled. I traded the bobcat for the celica, which lasted for years. Those were the days! 😘

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              • Ha! I wanted a Mercury Cougar but I couldn’t afford it.
                I had one of the first Infiniti’s to be introduced. The J30. I drove it for 22 years and it had less than 100k miles when I sold it, and it looked as good as it did the day I bought it.
                I still mourn for it. 😩

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  3. A big part of “getting over it” for me is this. The lies he told himself. Then told her. And then all the lies he told me. To him at the time I’m sure it’s what he felt. He felt our marriage was all but over, except he didn’t tell me that. He didn’t file for divorce or even separate. He felt unloved. He felt unworthy of love actually which is different. He put all of that on me. It was me that made him feel that way. He lacked self awareness and reflection. He was incapable of seeing through amm that bullshit to reality. Everything he told himself and her were justifications for being a shit bag. They both had to rationalize their behavior. Make it seem like well, if the wife were a better partner we wouldn’t be fucking around behind her back. It’s the part that we all sit and think, if I was that bad why did you stay? Oh, because I am not that bad. And their affairs have very little to do with their marriage. Its definitely a mindfuck.

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    • And every time, every single time I read something from a mistress’s point of view, which almost always includes some bad mouthing of the wife, it astonishes me how quickly and wholly they accept what the cheating husband is saying to them about the wife… and yet the husband doesn’t leave the wife for them. Even though they’re madly in love and wife is a bitch, who hates sex, and spends all his money, or whatever. Who wants to fight for a guy who’s cheating and lying just to be with you? It’s difficult enough for us to stomach taking them back even with years together and kids, houses, pets. It’s honestly mind boggling to me. Not to mention how much of the affair seems to be about sex. It’s medication for reality, really. If the other woman in our life ever believed we didn’t have sex, she was delusional. She must really be feeling sorry for him now. 5+ years later, still with me, such a horrible woman, no sex. LOL DELUSIONAL!

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      • I’ve wondered what was so attractive about a man actively deceiving his wife and toddler. Who thinks that is a good option? She wanted him to leave me to be with her. Who the hell wants that? I have a hard enough time seeing past it with 25 years history together. To start a relationship that way? Hell no. I get she has her demons and is a broken person. If she wasn’t they would have never “clicked”. She would have told him to fuck off. It’s very sad. If it wasn’t so destructive to innocent people I’d feel sorry for them. His AP told him about being molested by a family member.
        Our marriage was not in a good place when they met. So some of what he said was not out right lies. But it was his negative view of our life. It certainly wasn’t a real and fair account. Even so, they were in contact for a year and a half when I found out. After a few months of hearing excuses about why he hasn’t left me yet – ya think she would catch on and move on.
        Trying to figure it out is a waste of my time and energy and I really don’t put too much in it. Logically I know there was nothing special there. It was too broken people that acted like assholes. They lost, not me. I remained true to my integrity and morals. I was completely shattered but I chose not to break someone else in my path. I chose to pick myself up and heal without retribution. I’ve said before, of the 3 – I would still rather be me.

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        • Absolutely! And I’m sure a cheater, mistress, whatever, might read this post and comments and think we are conceited or that we think we are perfect, but the thing is, we chose the right path. And it’s okay to be proud of that. No one can bring us down for having integrity. ❤️

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  5. So so sad…and so so familiar. There’s no telling what loser told that tramp about me…but I know what he was telling me about her, and it wasn’t all nice.
    On a different note…Walt Disney used to work at the paper in Asheville (my hometown.). He was fired for drawing little mice all over the newsprint. LOL

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