Now I ask you where but here in BWS could you hear stories like these?? What a gas!

CountryGirl and LadyJane: While you respectively lost your "man of the cloth", I lost mine because he became a "man of the cloth". Albeit under very different circumstances, I understand very clearly what you meant by insufficient or ineffective support group for wives like us. In my case, there was not any at all and, I doubt if a support group even exists for circumstances like mine. My Mom was my counsellor, but she had passed away a few years before and, for obvious reasons, I could not approach my confessor. "Sink or swim" would be apt to describe the situation then.

Lola, I'm so sorry you didn't receive any help when you needed it most...I didn't get any prof help, but my family and friends were fantastic...even the kids from the Youth Fellowship I led used to come round to my house with boxes of chocolates and hugs, bless them! There was no counselling or anything available at that time, so as you say, it was "sink or swim".

Feeling abandoned, sadly, seems to be the norm in any of these situations. Abandoned in the sense that you receive no or little of anything from the very people who held you in high regard (supposedly). I had one woman in the congregation who was my very best friend. She did terrific seminars on a variety of subjects and worked alongside of me in the Womens Ministries programs. Our resignation came in late October 2001. Six months later (and the very week I had been diagnosed with breast cancer) she emailed me saying that I had given little thought to how this all affected the congregation and the whole situation was "too much for her." So, she could no longer have any contact with me. I was floored! I had bared my soul to her many times and counted her as a treasure and a true gift to me from God. My life was at an all-time low. I had cancer, no job, a husband still living with me but carrying on with his mistress....ughhhh!!! And now my best friend was dumping me. And the biggest thing was that there was no one to turn to! I wonder how I survived it all. But giving these people (the congregation) some credit, in later years I realize that it was so horrible and awkward that they really didn't know what to do. They, too, were trying to move on. My daughter lives closer to that area and still runs into people we knew. Several have gone into tears and said that they've always been concerned about what happened to me....that I seemed to just drop out of sight. ANd I suppose I did. Anything else was just too painful at the time. Support is hard to come by when things like that happen. While they may have wanted to support me, they were so angry with my husband and didn't want to run into him. Anyway, he moved out 4 months later for good.

Ladyjane, you are a survivor! I experienced similar things in that only my closest family and friends remained close to me...it was amazing how many church members, neighbours, etc dropped me like a hot potato! I even had people cross the street to avoid talking to me...and I hadn't done anything wrong! I think people just find it too terrifying to attempt to talk to someone who has just been cheated on.

They are embarrassed on our behalf and are perhaps afraid of upsetting us further or that we might break down in tears in front of them and they wont know what to do/say.

Mutual friends of my ex-husband and myself seemed to disappear completely, it was so weird. Again, I think it was so they didn't have to take sides.

Oh Ladyjane, I know the absolute heartache of having a husband living at home while he sees his mistress...those were the darkest days of my life.

Isn't it amazing how we picked up the pieces and moved on from it all? God is good.

It IS amazing how we picked ourselves up! When I consider all that was, I can hardly believe it myself. The devastation of losing all that I knew as my life.....home, friends, job, duties, everything my eyes saw daily....came to a very sudden ending. After my husband's humiliating resignation in late October, we had to stay in the parsonage until our move on December 1st. Fortunately, I have little memory of those weeks. You know what? I think I just, this very minute, learned something about myself as I type this! I always, ALWAYS loved the Autumn but since that time I go through a very sad, lonely time this time of year. This week I've felt tearful and sad and couldn't come up with a cause. Hmmm....I think I'm onto something here. Anyway, I, too, know that feeling of having people avoid you like you have the plague or something. And the thing is....we had done NOTHING wrong!!!! I had loved and supported this man for 30 years of my life and I just KNEW we would grow old and die together. I had the utmost of trust and respect for him. I have to say that to this day, I do not have that type of trust in anyone and especially my own dear husband. I trust him but not as I did before. I doubt I'll ever muster up that kind of respect and trust again for anyone. Sad, but true.

You ladies are amazing. I didn't really have anyone I could trust during my abusive marriage...not anyone who understood anyway so I will triple the amount of pain that you went through. How horrible.

Yes Hannelore, she's working on her book now.

All I can ever ask is WHY is support so very elusive when we're going through such ordeals? Do we do part of the hiding ourselves due to our inner conflict? Do we cease reaching out in any way? Do people run and hide from us because they don't know how to help or what to say? It's interesting to think through the "whys." It makes us all better friends.

After reading these devastating stories, I can’t help notice that you all seem to have found a new love and are happily married again.

Did any of you ever consider never marrying again? Just being on your own and truly free? Were you surprised that you could fall in love again, and begin anew?

Lots of questions I know. But I have had a marriage crisis this year, and I couldn’t help but think …never ever would I marry again. I found the thought liberating and uplifting. Of course if the new love is just everything you want,…then fine. But I would think you have to be willing to compromise all over again, in order to live in harmony. I don’t think I would want to risk that. I definitely would not want to be a loner. I would love to have loads of friends to accompany me along the various paths in life…but marrying again; uh-uh.

I have to stand up and applaud hou ladies for your strength. Ladyjane you are an amazing survivor...

I have a story that is similar about loss, yet altogether different. After I bacame a widow for the second time, I swore off men for fear of being hurt yet again. I did meet a man some years later that one could describe as an emotional cripple, divorced, wife cheated with his business partner and they took him to the cleaners. Along comes me, fragile myself but keeping up appearances. Anyhow I stuck by him during thick and thin, he cried a lot, moaned and groaned, was impotent, the whole ball of wax...

In a year with me standing by him, he was again building beautiful log homes, was featured in Beautiful Homes magazine as Architect of the year, had a thriving business and had done a completed 180% turn around, for the better. He asked me to marry him. Now he lived in Jackson Hole, Wyoming and I was still in Vegas. So we did the long distance, and phone thingy for awhile. One night he calls me and says, he didn't want to marry me.......... KNOW WHY? Get this!!!
He says because I was his rock, his motivation and I stood by him during the most trying time in his life, I gave him hope, love and understanding, trust, everything he needed to rebuild his shattered ego and life....Heres the good part! He didn't want to marry me because everytime he looked at me he said, it would remind him of what he was, of the blackest time in his life, and he just wanted to forget it, put the memories behind him. How about that for being dumped????