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I was wondering what others views/experiences of empathy are, when trying to R with their WS.

Is your WS empathetic and more importantly, how do they show you this through their actions?

In the face of your anger and upset, how do they continue to remain empathetic towards you?

My WW has not been a very empathetic person. She has had some childhood trauma in that she lost her mother at 10 and her father at 22, both to cancer. She has learned to be alone and not share feelings so she lacks a certain amount of empathy. She also is a rug sweeper. The results have not been having a great effect on me. I’m willing to work with her on that but time is running out. Wish I could have been more informative but that’s all I’ve got.

My WW is similar to Copingmybest… some childhood trauma never really dealt with and basically told by her mom that she alone is responsible for her own happiness… don’t rely on anyone else. Maybe a grain of truth that if you’re not happy, someone else won’t necessarily be able to fill that happiness "void" for you. However, the has taken this to am extreme and I fully believe it is a major factor in why she struggles with empathy.

I read somewhere that if a person could feel the pain and devastation infidelity inflicts in their partner, no ‘feeling’ human could ever cheat.

[This message edited by dontlookbackinanger at 1:56 PM, Thursday, November 23rd]

Right now, she’s the best she has ever been.

But this is the second time in our long relationship that I have had to bleed out for her to think ‘gee, he’s so upset, he must love me’.

We both came from families damaged by infidelity. We took different lessons from the experience.

It took the best part of a year for WW to truly comprehend the full extent of the damage she had done to our marriage and realize how deeply it cut into my.psyche with a pain of a level I have never before experienced after she revealed her LTAI I never ranted at her after DDay, never called her any vile names, I bore internally a lot of what I felt, but she certainly saw in every other way, how it had changed me as I spun into depression and lost all sense of self worth. and dignity. Initially she made some clueless, self-serving crass remarks about how she thought it wouldn't affect me so profoundly and how she thought I would get over it faster...she now realizes how damaged I have become and understands what a mountain of work it will take to create a new pair bond. It required, I think, s long and deep conversation with her best friend, who wss also a betrayed wife, for WW to understand the depth of pain and despair a betrayed spouse feels and how deeply she had hurt me with her betrayal of me.WW had read the Glass book "Not just friends" amongst others, but she didn't internalize the message until she had her girlfriend knock sense into her. Now my wife is a changed person in how she has found a wellspring of empathy. And it sure helps.

It took an about a year for my FWH to really get that. I remember in the first month….after some intensive IC…he approached me and said "I think I can hold space for your pain a bit"…. In hindsight, I think it was something he must have asked his IC in terms of helping me. Those words had never passed his lips before. The idea of it, opened my flood gates, which naturally overwhelmed him and he shut down again.

But, we’ve kept on keeping on.

A few moments ago….I mentioned to him that I was struggling. Holiday, A season, stress from family get togethers. A moment ago, as I was logging in here….he popped up to give me a kiss and ask if I was feeling better. I’ll call that a win.

He is much more capable of empathy now than before the A. But, it was definitely a skill he learned through this.

Are you in MC? This sounds like a perfect thing to address and practice in MC. My husband and I spent a lot of time working on this and it was absolutely

One of the things that I learned and had to work on while working on R was that it's nearly impossible for most people to find empathy when they are being attacked. It's basically human nature to shut down and/or become defensive when you are being yelled at. It engages a person's primative fight/flight/flee reflexes. I found that if I was able to express my trigger/anger/upset more calmly and using MC language

When I was able to do this, he was better able to recognize what I was saying wasn't an attack, but a bid for assurance and comfort and an opportunity for him to comfort me. He was then able to respond with empathy and to focus on my hurt rather than his protection. It eventually resulted in would take something that previously could have spiralled and turned into an argument (where I ended up feeling MORE lonely and scared and triggered), into a moment of connection.

I am forever recommending it, but if you haven't read the pinned article in the Wayward section called things every WS needs to know, I really recommend you do so. It contains a bit of a script that I found really helped my husband to know what to say when I was triggering. I'll reproduce it below:

HERE’S A GREAT TIP: You will find it’s particularly meaningful to them when they’re obviously feeling low, but they’re locked in silence and aren’t expressing it to you. Just imagine… In their moments of unspoken loneliness or despair, you walk up to them, hug them and say, "I just want you to know how grateful I am that you’re giving me a second chance. Thank you so much. I love you more than ever for this. I’ve been feeling so ashamed of what I did and how much pain I caused you. I want you to know that I’ll never do anything to hurt you like this – ever again. I know I broke your heart and it torments me. I want you to know your heart is safe with me again."

These are beautifully comforting words, particularly when they’re delivered at such a perfect

moment. You can memorize the quote, modify it, or use your own words, whatever is most

comfortable for you. The key is to include, in no particular order, all six of these components:

A statement of gratitude.

An expression of your love.

An acknowledgment of your spouse’s pain.

An admission that you caused their pain.

An expression of your sense of shame.

A promise that it will never happen again

Unfaithful spouses I’ve counselled often report that this most welcome surprise is the best thing they did to lift their partner’s spirits – as well as their own.

I'm sure it sounds silly or artificial to have a script (obviously, put your own words in), but it really helped my husband who often clammed up when I was triggered because he didn't know what to say and was afraid of saying something that might make things worse. When he wasn't triggered himself, he was certainly capable of feeling empathy but expressing it (particularly in a way that I could hear) was more difficult for him. Having a script to follow gave him some confidence, and I must say, it typically worked at diffusing my anger. He had asked me so many times what I wanted him to do and I never really knew in the moment when I was escalated and sometimes I wanted something different each time. The script basically covers all your bases .

It's not an easy process. It wasn't always linear. Neither of us handled things perfectly and we made a ton of mistakes, but the things we worked on in MC and following this script when dealing with triggers helped a lot.

Good luck.