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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]OP, how are you? [/quote]

Thank you for checking in. We are back home now and I’m having a hard time. Overall I just feel exhausted and frustrated and sad, mixed in with some moments of absolute anger. I tried to talk to him about it again, and while I’ll admit I’m not really sure what he could say that WOULD make me feel better, I left the convo feeling more upset. Notably, he said, “I wish I could remember what happened,” (to which I incredulously asked if he thought I was lying about this. He doesn’t; he just feels weird and “it bothers [him]” that he blacked out and can’t remember what happened. Which, to be clear, I do believe is probably the case), and he also said, “I made a MISTAKE.” This was mixed in with a lot of apologies and “I hate myself”s, but those two comments really bothered me. Enough that I find I’m avoiding talking about it (…which is surprisingly easy to do, as we have our 3 kids with us 24/7 currently), because deep down I don’t (at this point) want to blow up my family, and I think that if he says the wrong thing right now I may never be able to get over it. In general he’s just kind of just acting normal / like nothing happened - which to be fair right now mostly means just going about daily moment to moment life with the kids, but with us interacting pretty minimally. He also keeps asking what he can do, and I think it’s genuinely coming from the right place but I just feel like…ugh don’t put this on me; if I knew what needed to happen to make everything magically feel okay, I’d do it. I did tell him (re: “what can I do”): no drinking (he gets this and agrees), sleep in a different room (he doesn’t love this but gets it and didn’t fight it), take the kids out of the house so I can have a counseling appointment and not worry about them hearing anything, and to eventual couples’ counseling if/when it’s time. But beyond that I don’t know what to tell him to DO to fix it, because if I knew we wouldn’t be in this situation. I do think he feels genuine remorse and is almost having a hard time reconciling it mentally, because he definitely thinks of himself as an extraordinarily caring, good person - I don’t mean that to sound snipey, just saying that’s his genuine mental impression of who he is as a person (and, generally speaking, rightly so) so hearing that he’s done something like this changes it in a way that’s hard to reconcile. He keeps saying “I would NEVER in my right mind do something like this…” - I don’t even know if it makes me feel worse or better to hear that. I do feel a little of the anger subsiding when we talk and when he really seems to listen to what I’m saying and grasp how serious this is for me, but the disgust I feel is really strong. I also just feel, I don’t know….kind of detached? I guess I feel a sense of weird mourning, in a looking around and thinking wow this is all a sham, everything I thought I felt has changed way

The stuff people shared about custody / courts is scary to read (and, tbh, hard to understand) - that’s not really on my mind currently, I honestly can’t see divorcing, but it does make me nervous about talking to a counselor since a PP said counseling notes get shared in court all the time. It would take a LOT for me to want to subject my kids to a divorce, and honestly I can’t really picture it happening - but one worrisome scenario that’s lurking in the back of my mind is this: what if I can never allow myself to feel comfortable having sex with him again? At this time the thought literally REPULSES me; the idea of him touching me makes me see RED. I know this is the kind of thing counseling can hopefully help with, but what if it doesn’t…then I guess divorce is the option you’re left with, and the idea of counseling notes being admissible in court makes me nervous to talk to someone.

That said, I do have a doctors on demand (through employee benefits, hopefully they’re decent) appointment set up for tomorrow. Guessing I should probably try to set up a couples’ counseling thing too but I don’t know if I have it in me just yet. It’s hard for me to even hear his voice right now, the visceral reaction my body feels kind of scares me. I’m just holing up with my baby right now.

(As I side note, I literally do not have the mental energy to respond to accusations of me being fake, so I’m not going to. Think whatever you want; I don’t care. Not sure why on earth someone would make something like this up to post anonymously. Regardless, thanks to posters who have been so compassionate and supportive and helpful, I really need it and I appreciate all the good people here [/quote]

The feelings of anger, numbness, anxiety, sadness, and disgust you feel are part of trauma. It would be considered normal for this to go on for up to 4-6 weeks. OP, you should know that after trauma some percent of people go on to develop PTSD. Trauma treatment is very important in the first 4-6 weeks after an incident like this. You need to process the incident with a trained professional and develop an organizing narrative that helps your mind and body integrate what happened.

It would also be helpful to have your husband participate in couples sessions as soon as possible. Otherwise what can happen is you both develop your own narrative of what happened and it’s very hard to come together after that. He needs to be guided to accept your experience and work together to integrate it  into a path forward.

I hope you get the help and support you need to heal, OP. [/quote]

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