When You Can’t Forgive

This is a true story. If you are American, or follow American politics, you will probably see the parallels. That is because the response mapped in this article, is far more usual than expected.

Mary, (not her real name) married Paul, (not his real name). He was working for government and so was she. They were in different sections, but the same Agency.

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She was cheerful and helpful and very nice. Her husband was quite charming as well. They seemed a perfect couple.

I learned he not only had an affair with a woman, but she gave birth to his child. I learned this before the wife did. It was one of those peculiar juxtapositions in which information is revealed, and you just keep it silent.

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I don’t know when or how Mary found out, but I know she found out, because she changed.  She changed so much I couldn’t recognise her.

Instead of the sunshine, became rain. Miserable, bitter, cold,  the kind of person you don’t want to have to deal with. Stories about her, how horrible she was were on everyone’s lips.

A woman who had once been a pleasure to encounter was now toxic.

No one wanted to work with her.

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Her habits changed, especially at work.

She would arrive early and start pressuring the people around her. She would work through the lunch hour, so that many of the employees complained. The administration changed the rules so that  there would be a shift at one p.m. so who had been assigned to her could escape, and others, who had lived nice lives up until then, would suffer.

Mary continued beyond quitting time. Those who were assigned to her complained. She was ordered to cease at 4:30. However there was a special evening shift, so that she would continue from 4:30 until 9:00 with other staff.

To say she lived at work was true. And so was saying that  she was universally hated.

She was moved from one office to another, because people refused to work with her. Finally, she got a divorce. Two decades after Paul’s first adultery.

After the Divorce she began to reclaim who she had been, but it was very late in her life. Had she divorced Paul shortly after the adultery, perhaps it may have taken her a year to return to who she was, not decades.

<a href="http://www.hairstylesville.com/2016/10/45-cool-and-classy-pixie-short.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Source</a>

The fact is, there is a difference between forgiving a person and saying it.  A difference between being able to live past it, and not.

There are women whose husbands were unfaithful decades ago, but they worked it out, went on, and one would never know.  There is no resentment, no carry overs.  These women are far rarer than Mary.

Most women do not easily get over adultery.  Many carry it all their lives like a cancer.

Hilary Clinton was once a happy friendly kind of person. Then came the Lewinsky affair.  Since then she is cold and bitter and people who hated Trump could not make the effort to vote for her.

Had she divorced Bill in 2001 and gone on with her life, she would probably be President of the United States today.