The Big Lie

I’m not even going to point to a link. Everyone knows what happened in NJ. I’m just going to take this into a different direction. If I knew in my lifetime that my spouse was going to step out on me, would I be more devastated with it being another woman or with it being a guy?

Beth over at SWWBO was saying she would be devastated if she found out her husband was gay and then he announced it to the world. Boy howdy, me too.

So I’ve been mulling this over all day. I decided that I would be far more damaged if it was a man. That would mean our entire lives had been one big lie. At least if it’s a woman, you think that he could have just been really stupid or it was a symptom of a bigger problem… probably a recent problem. But doing the deed with the same sex? That’s not a symptom of a bigger marital problem. He's been fibbing to you every time he had sex with you. He's been lying everytime he said he loved your body. There is just so much more mentally damaging stuff.

I would be completely sick. I would want the world to swallow me whole and disappear forever. I’ve had many many friends who have had their spouses step out and all of them but one stayed and worked it out. (The one who ended up divorced… he was an abusive jerk so I was glad when they ended up divorced.) It wasn’t a ‘Stand by your Man’ kind of thing. These women loved their husbands, a horrible mistake that will haunt everyone forever was made, there are children involved, and they both realized that there were bigger issues. When your spouse steps out on you with another man… there ain’t no workin’ thangs out. He’s gay. It’s done. Forever. And your kids are damaged too. I think that would magnify it all.

The woman I have known whose husbands have had an affair all say their self esteem took a huge hit. They felt ugly, undesired, at some point somewhat responsible, “what did I do wrong that would make him go elsewhere”, “why am I not woman enough to hold onto my man”. Nearly every one of them had feelings of woeful inadequacy at some time, even if it was fleeting.

Damn. I just can’t even imagine how I would feel if it were a man. Horror. Vast Humiliation. Compound all they felt and just throw some gasoline on that bad boy fire.

Believe it or not, this is something we discussed once at work. One of my bosses was engaged in college and found his fiancée in bed with another woman. His take was that he was pissed as hell, but didn’t take a self esteem dive at all because as he put it, “Hell! She liked women and I’m not one! Nothing personal there.” A woman in my group agreed with him, she felt that she would feel that same way.

Not me though. I think I’d be more of a mess. Blech.