I don't really know how it happened

I don't really know how it happened, and still sometimes I can't believe that it happened.

I need to tell the story, but somehow when I try to find the words it sounds like excuses. That's not my intention at all. There's no excuse for sin.

I am a sinner, and I am at fault. I was weak. I fell. I knowingly and willingly sinned.

My sin is adultery.

My marriage has been rocky for a long time. My greatest fault in my marriage has been laziness. I'm not a great housekeeper or a very good cook. I have a hard time keeping up with my responsibilities. I spend too much time online. I practice NFP for birth control (which means that he can't make love as much as he wants). As for my husband, he constantly puts me down. There is very little that I do right. When I do do something right, I don't hear about it. I don't get encouragement, or validation, or thanks. When I try to include share with him my personal triumphs, interests, and projects, his lack of interest is palpable. Neither do I get affection; sex the only time he touches me, and that to me makes it feel like mutual masturbation. It's not in the least "unitive". At this point, I'm just doing my duty, but not very often. So what it boils down to is that for over a decade and a half, I've been told very little except that I'm...no good.

Some people suggest that he's been abusive to me: psychological abuse. I don't know. It's so subtle. He doesn't yell and scream at me. He's never laid a finger on me. It's all cold logic, and sometimes anger but without raising his voice. Because it's so logical, so calm, I have no choice but to believe him. He's right about my faults. He doesn't make them up, they are there. Sometimes his put-downs are in the form of jokes that he tells the kids, laughing. "Your mother is (whatever imperfection is on his mind at the moment), eh guys?" When I protest, he says "That was just a joke! Don't you have a sense of humor?" He teaches our children to have no respect for me.

This has not only utterly destroyed my self-esteem but has made me VERY lonely. I'm so lonely I silently cry myself to sleep nearly every night.

There's more to this story. But that's a beginning.