How do you cultivate true sorrow/remorse for your betrayed SO?

I am admire your strength and determination. Your drive to bring to bring further understanding, learnings, and hope to your recovery. I can't help but to feel heartbroken from your impossible situation. I don't think you can fully empathize with your wife, if she doesn't talk to you at all. What does she really struggle with? What are her triggers? What part of the addiction hurts her the most? How does she feel about you?
There are some things I think you can do. One is to practice humility with her, admit that you are flawed and can use her help. Secondly, you have to show vulnerability, let her know how you fell when she doesn't talk to you, how you would like to understand how she feels. Lastly, I think it would help to find out how you two can find a time to relate with each other and to be honest with each other.
There are some things I think about it in terms of betrayal trauma, and the reality break that happens through either disclosure or discovery. The former reality no longer exists (if it ever did in the betrayed eyes). A new reality comes into shape as the disclosure comes out, and the addict begins recovery. Then there is the reality the two of you share with each other post recovery, if you choose to do so. All I can think of with your wife is she is avoiding the new reality from your PA. She doesn't want to know about it, or think about it, let alone talk about it. She is lying to herself, and ensuring neither of you can start to heal or move on. She is in a suspension of disbelief, and has put your relationship and interactions with you on pause. Find out what you can do, what repair attempts, or conversations or actions that can be started or achieved for her to start talking again, to face the new reality, and hopefully find out what that means for the two of you.

 

I think in generally what I have found is that men have a harder time empathizing with others than women do. I think that they can understand someone is hurt, and why, but they cannot actually put themselves in that situation. A big part of that is because men are just not as “in touch” with their own feelings as women are. If you cannot identify the feeling in yourself, you are likely to be unable to identify it in others. I think that working on getting in touch with your own feelings can help you to be better when it comes to empathy. I also think that for addicts in recovery, particularly for a year (like you) you start to think how far you have come, how hard it is, and don’t understand why she is still hurt about it. But again you have been dealing with this for years, it is all very new to her. I just commented on another post about this but the number one thing is to put her first, and do that always. This is the thing addicts struggle with the most. I think if you get to that point then you will be better with empathy. Say something about how she feels or her pain, without also including your own in that sentence. Practice that. My wife is hurt solely because I lied to her for years. She is not responsible for this. This was 100 percent my fault, and I will need to work for the rest of my life to fix this. And do not follow it with “but I have come so far.”

 

Does she have a journal? Is she starting to work recovery now?

If I were in her shoes and if she really wants to try to make the marriage work (even on a small level) she must start doing things in line with that desire (words and actions must start lining up).

Journaling with prompts really gets one to think. You may not know what triggers her and such, but do you think she knows? And how can you know what triggers her when she doesn't know all that you've done?

An easy journal question could be "List all my current triggers" or "What is the most painful aspect of this whole PA thing?" or "Do I want to save the marriage?" or "Will I ever be ready to talk to my husband about this?" etc.

Once she has answers to those questions and can talk more openly, I think you will be exposed to raw pain, and seeing her like that might evoke something in you.

Right now are you aware of how deeply this affects your wife? Have you seen her breaking down a lot? Has she ever used words to describer her pain (lots of us SO's have talked about a death of a thousand cuts, or like in Helping Her Heal, the uzi metaphor)?

Even in the Help Her Heal video he says that grief is an opportunity for you PA's to help. But how can you help and feel empathy if the SO never comes to you and open up or just hides and stuffs their feelings?

This empathy thing is a two way street, it takes two. If she allows herself to answer the tough questions, reflect, and have some acceptance with her feelings and triggers, she then can allow you in, and you will see the full extent of the damage, which hopefully you start to feel empathy ...

Make any sense? Or was I just rambling?

 

This is exactly right. Until your wife, from her own words, from her heart - lets you know/hear her pain, you will not be able to feel it / empathize with her. @Wade W. Wilson asked me, during one of our talks to go through each of our d-days, from my perspective, in detail, how I felt - he wanted to know and hear it from me. He didn't like it but needed to know - that night changed a lot for him and how he understood my pain.

This is a good start, remember what I said - when @Wade W. Wilson first came to me with the idea of the chats, I was just an active listener - took a bit before I began talking back, then those chats bloomed into full-blown hourly discussions.

 

I have both of these, they are very good. Hubby doesn't seem interested in discussing the subject right now so I'm going through them on my own.

 

TH2C, your wife is very different from me, I'd say opposite. You don't hear much from her regarding her triggers/ struggles and pain. My poor husband hears it ALL. He has said he wants to understand what he did to me (I think his counselor encourages this)... so I REALLY let him understand. He has seen me sobbing, hyperventilating and crying until my eyes are so swollen they can't even open. He has seen me so angry that I want to punch his face in. He has seen the aftermath of my anger shown on items that used to be precious and sentimental to me. I tell him many of my triggers, I let him know I can't even go out in public without a trigger if I see a cute girl.

He had a small inkling of the panic when he though I had used my "hall pass" that I granted myself... (I didn't, and don't really plan to), but he said his heart started pounding and he couldn't breath, had to go get out in the fresh air and walk... I told him that is how I feel every time a trigger happens... that gave him some empathy, maybe.

He also said in a very sad, sober voice, I can still hear your wails of pain.... I think he is referring to our counseling session where I totally melted down physically shaking and hunched over in the fetal position in my chair... so my husband is "lucky" that he doesn't have to guess what is in my heart, I vomit it all over him... very dramatically... because that's my personality I guess, I like to call it "passionate", but it's probably "dramatic", lol.

Your wife? I don't know, it's such a hard situation for you, you've been very patient, you have turned yourself around and you are a good husband, respecting her boundaries... and waiting.....

I've been reading this book Treating Trauma from Sexual Betrayal and it talks about "freezing" and I thought of you and your wife. (the act of not acting).. There is fight (me), flight (sometimes me), and freezing (your wife).... and it says freezing is common with sexual betrayal trauma. It's the freezing based trauma that prevents individuals from taking action... I'm quoting the book here... when were freeze in relationships, our (the SO's) lack of response is often seen as not caring...(I'm skipping a lot here).. the freeze survival response can also be activated when individuals feel helpless, and as if no matter what they do, they can't change the outcome.

I think maybe your wife feels this helplessness... "no matter what I do, it doesn't really matter, my spouse is going to act out anyway"... apathetic and hopeless. She doesn't know your progress, or doesn't trust it, which is very sad. I'm only 23% done with this book and I'm on Chapter 5 Discovery: The Painful Beginning... but I will let you know what I learn from the "freezing" trauma and how to break through it.

 

I haven't read this book, but I totally identify with the freezing, though not to the extent as th2c's wife. But for me, instead of thinking, "It doesn't matter how I feel, he'll act out anyway," (although, there is that a little bit), rather it's, "It doesn't matter how I feel, it doesn't change anything that has already happened. What is the point in talking about my feelings about it?" He already knows somewhat, what he doesn't know he'll probably never understand anyway, and if I try to make him understand, it will more than likely just make him feel guilty for things that have already happened or that I'm trying to hold a grudge or throw it in his face. It's like, what's the purpose? I'll just get over it on my own.

 

So to answer your question maybe try investing in what a Mediator needs.

Relating to Nines

• Ask them what they want and need, and give them time to discern the answer.
• Avoid coming on too strong, getting impatient or creating pressure.
• If you sense they are reluctant or unsure about something they said “yes” to or agreed to do, let them know that it’s ok to say “no.”
• Encourage them to determine their priorities and support them to take action
• Stay present to them when they are angry.
• Share body-based activities such as walking, exercising, cooking or eating.

(Taken from the link you provided above)

My job just took part in something like this. People similar to Nines were called “Harmonizers” with our test. The people in this group that I work with all agreed that it takes a lot for them to be trusting & vulnerable with someone, especially since most of their time is spent toward making sure they have proven themselves trustworthy of others confidences. So when they find someone they rely upon to open up to and believe that person genuinely cares for them it’s a big deal. Faith and trust are not taken lightly by a Harmonizer. And if that is broken, so is their confidence in their judgement of believing someone could care so much for them to put them first the way they put everyone else before themselves. They rely upon authenticity and believe strongly in their morals so when someone goes against that, they don’t know how to or don’t want to deal with that. This doesn’t mean it’s impossible to change their point of view after betrayal but you really have to go above and beyond to reestablish the connection you broke. Afterall, they have gone above & beyond to prove their trustworthiness, they only are asking for the same in return.

Me? I’m not a Nine or a Harmonizer btw. Loyal Skeptic(6) and Achiever here.