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A new journal for a new beginning |
| It was my second week in the group but this girl had been gone my first week so it was my first meeting with her. She said she was working on expressing emotions; I said I had trouble making and maintaining connections. No sooner had we completed introductions, then she dropped a bomb. "I slept with my best (male) friend. I haven't told my husband." It is so hard not to pass judgement. Maybe I shouldn't have weighed in at all. I've never had a serious relationship, never had sex, and have certainly never been married. I was instantly angry that someone would once again validate my fears that love, even married love, is fickle. I ruminated on her story and my ability to handle betrayal if I were in this woman's husband's position. She said it wasn't planned, and that she loved her husband (or rather said, "we have a lovely life together"). She teared up when she thought about how hurt he would be if he ever found out, but believed he would not leave her. She said she was more guilty about the intimacy, rather than the sex. She said sex was not a big deal for her, but it was for her husband. If the tables were turned she would not fall to pieces, but rather try to get to the root of the problem. She believed her husband would be crushed, she even claimed he was weaker because he felt things so deeply. I couldn't help but call her on the carpet on that. "Is that weakness?" I asked as calmly as I could. "You're the one that cheated sweet-cheeks," I thought, but didn't say. "Maybe weakness isn't the right word," she replied. I suggested "sensitive" might be better, and she seemed to agree. I said I didn't understand how people could claim to be in a committed relationship even after cheating. Committment should create some sort of a "block" against this sort of thing. She replied that my ideal was not based in reality and that she understood how frustrating it must be for someone who has never been in a serious relationship to comprehend her situation. She seemed sincere enough, but that comment still pissed me off. As of now, the group only knows that I've never been in a serious relationship. They probably think I lost my virginity in the back seat of a car with a drunken frat boy, or maybe that I was raped. The fact that sex has never been a part of my life is something that they, most people in fact, could not comprehend. I don't know if I'll ever tell them. A longer standing group member, a gay man about my age, had been asking her more specific questions, but was no less reactive than me. He had been in a 4 1/2 year relationship with a real hound and this girls story hit a sore spot. He brought up the point that he did not have the right to marry and that he was tired on seeing straight people "shit all over their wedding vows." He also said that the he had looked up to this girl for her strength and felt almost personally betrayed that she would fall from grace this way. Another group member, another man my age confessed that he was dating a married woman, though he didn't know it when they first met. He would also be missing group next week to take a trip to Florida with her. I asked him if his lover was separated from her husband. He said she wasn't, but that they were "talking about divorce." "Does her husband know about you?" I asked. "Yes, he does," he replied. I said it was good that at least this three-way relationship was an honest one. "You can't help who you're drawn to," he replied. I had nothing to say to that. I had already explained how all this betrayal had reaffirmed my fear to connect. I guess the group leader felt it was time for me to be on the hot seat. "You are afraid of betrayal and abandonment, Anna," she said, "Have you ever been abandoned?" "Many times,"I replied, "mostly by parental figures." I sensed the frustration from the group. They just knew I had a tragic romantic story, but I don't. I guess I'm still a child in that respect, a 32-year-old child. I told them how easy it was for me to cut people loose at the first sign of betrayal. I told them I had broken contact with everyone I knew in high school and that only one college friend was still in my life. In the 10-years since I graduated from college, I have acquired a small group of friends. There is nobody I talk to regularly. Sometimes I go into reclusive funks and don't return phone calls and emails. I know I have true friends because they don't let me get away with it. The level of trust I have for the select few is hard to come by. "That sounds like a very lonely life," said the cheating woman. "It is," I replied, "It always has been." "What is it about these stories you've heard today that upsets you," asked the group leader. "It makes me lose hope," I replied, "There are no boundaries that are unacceptable to cross. How can anyone's heart be safe." "What do you mean by boundaries," asked the leader. "Rules," I replied. "Give us an example," said the leader. Having no romantic history, I pulled from what I could. "If there wear no rules about child abuse, it would have been acceptable for my mother to break into the bathroom while her 13 year old daughter was soaking in the tub and dispatch open handed smacks to her wet skin." I continued. "If there were no rules about child neglect, it would have been acceptable for my perpetually unemployed father to leave the house such a mess that there were maggots under the dirty dishes and silverfish under the piles of unopened bills." "It is not okay for people to mistreat each other, but it happens. Even with rules you are helpless," I said. The leader turned the quiet girl seated next to her, the youngest of us at about 20-years-old, who hadn't said much this meeting. "What do you think of that, G?" G teared up and explained that the apartment she had grown up in that the house was kept clean, or as clean as possible with 2 adults and 6 children. Then her parents stopped paying the rent and, after several months, the family was evicted. During those months G remembered her mother hoarding her kids school papers, boxes of papers, loose papers strewn all over the apartment. It was a 3 month period in the 9 years they had lived there. Now G finds she cannot remember what it was like before that time, no matter how hard she tries "home" is gone. The leader sat between us. "The sadness here is palpable," she said. With that the session ended and the group members were given the option to stay for post-processing, when the leaders discuss the session without interruption from the group members. The cheating woman was praised for her courage in sharing her infidelity and weathering what could have been perceived as attacks from the other group members. The issue was then discussed in terms of the two sides "the hurters and those who have been hurt". There seemed to be a very strong sense of right and wrong, though not everyone tended to agree on the definitions. Though draining, it was said to be good to have a civil discussion where both sides were represented. The cheating woman was encouraged to look into the reasons why she strayed. She had lost 6 people who were close to her within a two-year period. She and her husband had been discussing having children but she had be diagnosed as having the Tay-sachs gene. This could mean her child could potentially be born terminally ill. She had also had an abortion at 16 that could be having a residual effect. I had not known her history when I weighed in on her cheating, and my feelings are still conflicted now that I do. There was a discussion of the sadness between G. and me. How losing a sense of home requires time to grieve. ************************** The group meets Tuesday evenings and I'm mildly grateful that I will have to miss to train for my new job. I'll be back the following week as long as it isn't this exhausting all of the time. |
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