SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I know I should, I know I probably could, but I do not hate him. Even after all of the many betrayals all of the lies and deceit, I do not hate him.

My problem has been for sometime, I love him and others so much more deeply than I love myself. I guess in the world we live in, this is a flaw to want to love unconditionally.

I am angry, hurt, confused...etc. But I cannot find a way to hate. Not him or anybody in my life. Is that the only way to get through this is hate our spouses for what they have done?

How long since Dday? I say give it time. I'm starting to feel the hate.

I also didn't feel hate, but I don't think its a good thing.

And maybe that's why I am trying Reconciliation, again.

But now, I am not in love either.

We are both working to rebuild the love and the relationship. I don't know your story, but mine also involved several betrayals.

Wish you all the best.

Don't worry too much about him. Focus on loving yourself.

Why do we have to hate? I feel sad and I feel sad for my WS who couldn't share his true feelings with me and then he had the burden of lying and the results of that on him and on me. Sometimes anger can get you in motion if you're stuck, but hate never led anywhere positive from my way of thinking.

You do not need to hate to survive infidelity. You need to learn to unconditionally love yourself and find your value and worth from within yourself.

This worked for me.

(((Smallwonders)))

My wh asked me if I hated him. Said “you must hate me”

What I told him was that I don’t hate him, I hate what he did.

There is no reason to have to hate him. What purpose would that fill?

You also don’t have to love him either if that’s not how you feel. You feel how you feel. If the love is there, there is

Nothing wrong with that. If you decide you don’t want to r and you live him still, it will fade over time. If you are wanting to r and live him, it’s a good place to start.

However, if you find that you do eventually feel hate, that’s okay too. You get to feel however you feel.

I don’t hate my husband.

I do hate what he did and I do hate the man he was during his affair but I definitely don’t hate the man he is today. I just hope he continues to make better decisions than he did.

I don't hate WH.

I hate AP with a passion.

I love myself.

It is less about not hating him as it is about you not loving you. This is why you do what you do even though you know what you do is unhealthy for you.

You have said he is neither remorseful nor doing any work. You've said he is deeply broken and acknowledge your role in the dysfunction of your relationship.

You know what you need to know. You know you need not hate him for what he did, but I think your putting it in that context helps you sidestep what should be your focus: you.

Leaving a cheater is not as much out of hate as it is an acceptance that they are toxic and stand as a barrier to getting to a happier, healthier place.

So you don't hate him. Ok, now move on to what is really the issue.

I don't think you need to hate your WS to get through what happened. I actually think it's healthier if you don't.

I still have a lot of emotions about what happened -- sadness, anger, anxiety, hopelessness, frustration, acceptance -- and they come and go in waves. Hate (luckily) is one of them. I don't even hate the OW! I think she's an idiot, but I also think she's been hurt many times and isn't smart enough to look in the mirror, realize the role she's played in it, and how she uses her past pain and betrayals to justify hurting others, which... it doesn't.

Anyways, I think it's a great thing if you don't have hate in your heart.

As for wanting to love unconditionally, have you researched codependency? Or are you/have you been in therapy to deal with these feelings, and why you should love yourself more?

DIFM... thank you for challenging me.

So you don’t hate him. Ok, now move on to what is really the issue.

I grasping because I’m struggling to target what is the real issue I am stuck holding on.

It is very dangerous to continue to love and want that which hurts us. Hating is not the problem so much as loving and wanting the person or thing that has hurt us which shows a dependency and lack of self-love. Other people are not more responsible to us than we are to ourselves, and that means staying away from things and people who harm us. Boundaries--they are our job.

[This message edited by OwningItNow at 8:00 AM, June 14th (Friday)]

I think to a degree we all can relate.

I agree with Ripped62.

When the affair was disclosed, I so badly wanted to hate her. I couldn't. Part of this for me, was co-dependency. I was defined by the title of husband and her happiness it was pretty sickening.

That man is dead, thankfully. I love myself, first and foremost. As should you. We should always be our own plan A.

If you hate him, what will that give you? Satisfaction? Ability to walk away? Ability to stay? How will hating him help your progress and healing?

You do YOU!

Ibonnie ..I am in IC, I’ve not started to work on why I’m struggling to let go and move forward. I very well may be codependent. However, I do believe my spiritual and religious background has influenced greatly my ability to move forward. Thank you. I have much to think about.

It just seems there are those here who do hate their

Ws’s. They seem to be the happiest or strongest and are in forward motion. I may be wrong. I’ve never been the type of person who could do that. I do not put my own happiness before others. For me it is contradictory to what I believe.

I think I channeled my hate onto the OW in order to allow the positive feelings toward my H to surface and aid R. I hate what he did. Am disappointed in who he was. We can separate the person from the deed if they prove themself worthy. But I needed to channel a boatload of negative energy somewhere, and the OW was the logical choice.

I’ve never been the type of person who could do that. I do not put my own happiness before others.

How is hating the person who cheated on you putting your "own happiness before others"? You want your WS to be happy more than yourself?

I'm not really a hateful person. But you don't have to hate others to love yourself first. Loving yourself first is like putting on your oxygen mask before you help others. You cannot help others if you are emptying your bucket and never refilling it. It is most loving to have boundaries with others. It doesn't benefit them to let them have unbalanced or even predatory relationships. That's dysfunctional for everyone involved.

Put yourself first. But no, you don't have to hate others, if that is coming from a place of deep self-love and acceptance, which makes it easier to love and accept others. If it's coming from a place of co-dependency and no self-esteem, then it's not a healthy thing.

I don't hate my WH. He has been in a lot of pain for a long long time and he let it bleed out all over everyone. I don't need to hate him to love myself too much to allow him to hurt me further. That's where you need to get to. You can love him and still love yourself enough to protect yourself from being hurt more by him.

I'm not sure hate is a good thing to hold onto. I had hate for my WS for a long time and it really poisoned me. I have since detached and am pretty close to indifference.

Do you feel indifference?