To the Women Who Slept with my Husband
I have shared a lot about my journey over the last few years. The journey that almost ended my life, was the difficult road of divorce. The last thing left unsaid is in regards to the "other women".
If you've ever considered being the "other woman", here are some things I would like you to know. I will never forget finding your number on my cell phone bill. He'd come home weeks before and told me he didn't think he loved me anymore. My gut told me there was someone else. I had just woken from a dream where he was sleeping with another woman and that prompted me to check the cell phone bill. There it was. Your number over and over again. So many minutes given to you.
I called you. I didn't say a word. My heart dropped when you answered the phone. Even if I asked you, I knew you would lie. Quite honestly he probably lied to you. Did he tell you we were still married? Did he tell you we still shared a bed? Did he tell you he committed to working on things? Did you think about me or my kids and how much what you were doing would kill us? Did you even care?
Time has passed and this is what I know to be true. It hit me, how desperate you were to be loved. I don't know what your marriage was like, but it obviously wasn't enough. How much you must have needed to feel wanted and understood by someone, even someone else's husband. He told you we were going through a divorce (although you heard these words long before I did), and you used those words to justify what you were doing. What you took part in hurt me and my children more than you will ever know.
I have been there. Wanting to feel supported, encouraged, loved, as if I mattered. I looked to all the wrong things and people as well, You go around telling people what a horrible person I am, and how I've wronged you, and I bet you think I do the same. But here is the truth...
I don't believe you are an awful person; I think you are a sinner.
JUST. Like. ME.
I struggle at times with wanting to hate you, wanting to be bitter, and wanting justice for my name as you both drag it through the mud. Then I remember that Jesus hung on a cross and died for every single sin either of us has and will ever commit.
I know that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. So, how can I not show mercy when I am given so much? We have all suffered dramatically because of our sin and yet God allowed these things to happen.
He has a plan and a purpose for our lives, and while this part of the journey was tough to walk through, I trust His word is real. I believe that he used everything and is using everything I went through for my good because I love Him.
I serve a sovereign God. Nothing happens, not one single thing, that doesn't first pass His loving hands. So, it's hard, but I trust that all of this was for the best, was for His glory.
I see His goodness. His faithfulness. I see it when I look into my children's eyes, that despite the absence of their father continue to grow, love, smile, and move forward. I see it in my new husband's eyes. The way that he loves God and loves me. The way he looks at me like no other woman exists. The way I trust him to protect my heart.
You need to know that I pray for you (and not in the typical Southern "I'll be praying for you" way). For the hole in your heart. The one you fill with approval from others. The one you try to fill with booze and a "good time". The one you tried to fill with my husband. That hole can only be filled and satisfied by God.
I pray that you both will be given wisdom to choose and honor God as much as His grace allows. I pray for God to open your eyes to the beauty and eternal commitment of marriage and that you will be blessed with a beautiful marriage of your own.
I want you to know that you are loved. You are loved by God who will never mistreat you, never abandon you, and never break your heart. The choices you've made have caused so much pain and I am sorry you're hurting. You had to be to have cared so little about ours. I have lived through bad decisions and their consequences, so I know how that feels.
You will never be my friend. I will never see you and not remember what the two of you did to my heart and my children's hearts. But....
You are not hated by me. I don't blame you. I forgive you.
I chose to base my feelings on what Christ did for me and what His word tells me is true.
"but God showed his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us"
~Romans 5:8
"A new commandment I give you that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this, all people will know that you are my disciples if you have a love for one another."
~John 13:34-35
"For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive yours."
~Matthew 6:14-15
P.S. This post is not addressed to any one person. It is a completion of all the many times I experienced betrayal at the hands of someone I thought loved me.
