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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Forgiveness by the other is over-rated.  My ex cheated.  He and the therapist constantly harped on my ability (or inability) to "forgive".  I felt like my ex wanted to say "I'm sorry", once and then demanded that I "forgive" him and move on.

I felt like there could be no true "forgiveness" (in the sense of "granting pardon for") unless my Ex really put in some effort to understand why he did it, how it impacted me and our children, and how he was going to prevent it from happening again.  Instead of doing the deep self-examination necessary, my ex shifted his focus to my flaw of being unable to "forgive."

There is another sense of the word "forgive", which is to "cease feeling resentment for".  That kind of forgiveness may come over time as the trauma of the infidelity subsides and you are able to move forward with your life (in whatever fashion).  Or you may "decide" to forgive and release what resentment you feel because it serves YOUR purpose.  Or you may decide that what was done was unforgiveable.  The failure to forgive doesn't preclude a person from moving on.

But, I don't think it is useful to "forgive" in order that your husband's emotional state can be eased.  Your emotions don't exist to erase your husband's pain and self-guilt.  He has to do his own work.  The only person who can "forgive" him is himself.  And, in order to do that he has to acknowledge and confront the magnitude of what he has done and why, make amends for it, and change his life and behavior so it doesn't happen again.

The focus after infidelity on getting the spouse's "forgiveness" to me just mimics what was wrong with the person who committed the infidelity in the first place -- they project their problems onto another person, identifying them as the cause of the problem, and "solve" the problem by substituting another person.  What the adulterer needs to learn is that his/her problems are within him/herself and are within his/her power to address in a more healthy way.
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+10000000000000. I was in therapy with an ex-fiancé who I had discovered was an active sex addict.  (Jerry Springer levels of crazy: prostitutes, 1-time hookups online whenever I went out of town on business, massage happy endings on the way home from work, unvelievable shit.) Insanely, in retrospect, I was reeling so much from complete shock and betrayal after finding out all this that I agreed to attend couple's therapy, while he went to individual counseling and 12-step meetings.  Mostly, I wanted answers about why he pushed for a commitment from me while he was cartoonishly violating that commitment pretty much every day.

We went to maybe 5 or 6 sessions when I started being pressured about why I couldn't forgive him and what was wrong with me that would prevent me from trusting him again when he was doing so much to stay abstinent.  I was flabbergasted...he was SO far from beginning to really understand why he did what he did, and basically I hears his "I'm sorry" as "Im sorry I got caught and ruined our relationship" more than "I'm sorry for what I did that hurt you and I am committed to never doing it again." But more and more, therapy became about my inability to forgive.  It was awful.  After a few months, I just stopped therapy and stopped having any contact with him.  Still sad that therapy really didn't help me gain any understanding about how and why I was so thoroughly deceived and betrayed, but I knew I was done when it became all about what I wasn't doing for HIS well being.[/quote]

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