I think you’re confusing forgiveness with acceptance. You can forgive him without accepting him back into your life in a position to hurt you the same way again. Realize that he is who he is. Forgive him whether he changes or not, whether he apologizes or not. But distance yourself from him now that it is becoming evident that he’s repeating a pattern. Forgiving does not require you to become a doormat or continue to accept the same treatment. The forgiveness is in big part for you…not him.

Dear flyby:

It is wrong and ineffective to ignore your anger for the purpose of forgiving. One’s goal in life should not be to forgive but to take good care of oneself. For the purpose of taking good care of yourself, you should listen to the valid messages behind your emotions. And your anger is a very important emotion because it has a very valid message every time you feel the anger.

You continue to feel angry at the man because you repeatedly ignore the message behind your anger. So what do you do? Aim at not feeling angry and forgiving or do you listen and respect the message behind the anger?

Your anger at him, the message, is it not, that he is hurting you, that you have been unable to set boundaries with him, and therefore you should have no contact with him?

If so, respect that message. Once you do, the anger having delivered its message- and trusting you to continue to respect the message over time- will weaken, dissipate. Message delivered. What do you think?

anita

Dear flyby:

Your hurt and anger are tangible, almost, in your posts. I think I understand: 20 years of this and unsuccessful attempts at other relationships has to be very frustrating, intensely painful.

All this time, over 20 years, invested, emotions invested and it seems for nothing as he is involved with another woman. And it is so, in my life, as well as in so many people’s lives, maybe most people… that so much of our times and efforts were spent for nothing. Wasted. Some people try to soften the blow of such realization with convenient thinking, saying to themselves this had made them stronger and such.. when in fact it was nothing but waste, repeating something ineffective over and over again.

This is one of the painful aspects of life, accepting the wasted time and wasted efforts, lost hopes.

Once accepted, it makes space to new hope, living in a new way, new and effective.

Please do post again with new thoughts…?

anita

* Dear William: I would like to read more of your story and reply. Can you start your new thread with your story (Click Forums above, get the screen with categories, choose one (Tough Times, Emotional Mastery are two categories), click that, go down the screen to the bottom where there is a box with space for a title and the body of your post). Looking forward to reading your thread.
anita

Dear flyby:

Will you tell more about your loss of faith? You wrote it is not a religiously based faith. What is it?

anita

Dear flyby:

You lost faith in the idea that someone can love you, is that correct? The fact that you were not told that your mother was sick until 2 weeks before she passed away means there was something important that was hidden from you, obviously very important: the very life and death of your own mother! Hiding something so important from you does not indicate love, is that it? And your father’s love for your mother was proven random like as he got involved with another woman so soon after your mother’s passing. That indicates he really didn’t love your mother, does it?

It is almost fitting your topic to be: Love does have an expiration…

Your heart is broken, I think.

Keep posting, please.

anita

Dear flyby:

I don’t know the details of what happened with your mother and your father, but if your father is part of the problem (certainly doesn’t seem like he has been a part of the solution)- it may very well be self sabotaging to try and open communication with him!

As far as dating again and not knowing how to be loved- good point. How would you identify being loved? Is it like the other guy: you pushing him away and him coming back? That is not necessarily love that kept him coming back! Could be he felt safe expecting you pushing him away again. Something to examine in therapy: what is love? How do you know you are loved? Excellent topic to examine.

One way I know is if a person hears me, cares about what I said, cares enough to remember and to pay attention to over time. If I care about something, and over time he remembers it… and if he cares about my mental well being. Through honest, ongoing communication. No abuse. ..?

anita

Dear flyby:

Figuring out what motivates people: first thing is to examine what we assume motivates a person in our lives and remove that assumption, think about other possibilities. We jump to conclusions, assuming we know. In the first ever good therapy I attended five years ago, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) with lots of Mindfulness skills taught, I learned to evaluate thoughts for the truth or lack of. I found out that we, people, assume so much that is not true. CBT is a scientific approach to understanding what is really going on.

Also in therapy I learned the value of asking people questions and evaluating the answers. Figuring out reality is something else. Are you familiar with CBT?

You wrote above that you gave up trying to figure him out. Then you wrote that you are trying to figure out what was making him keep you within arms reach. Do you want to try to figure the latter out here?

anita