Chapter 10 - How things change

To present day. I haven't added to the blog in over a month, and it is just because my marriage is going well. My wife and I are very, very happy, and I haven't been in the mood to talk about what we went through.

I'm having a bad time at work -- just normal career problems that have escalated to the point that I may make a change. I want to write more about those problems and how I have handled them (and mishandled them), because they relate to the affair experience. (The short version: I got used to playing the victim, and it affected my work relationships. Even though they had no idea about the affair, I let my marital problems -- and the pity party I let go on too long -- get in the way at work, and I'm paying the price).

Here is what I have to say about it today. Even though some of my problems at work are a direct result of the affair, I do not blame my wife. And, in dealing with the uncertainty of a career change, my wife and I are a team.

Think about what this means. For my perspective to be this way, I had to forgive, and it demonstrates to me that I have forgiven her completely. It also means that, while it is not my fault that she decided to have an affair, the affair was really only one component of our problems, and I have shared responsibility for the overall problems. You can only see that after a lot of growth and the perspective of several years of hindsight.

Plus, we see our lives and our futures as being linked together. We're a team. We are truly husband and wife, not just two individuals who share a kid and an address. I'm not sure that was true before she had an affair.

In other words, we are better now than ever before.