Tuesday, November 12, 2013

Hiding Information Is Lying

Me: "Where are you?"
Husband: "Driving to therapy."
Me: "Oh, OK. Blah, blah, funny story, blah, blah"
[people's voices in the background]
Me: "You are not in your car."
Husband: "Well, I'm at Long John Silver's {side note...that place is so gross}."
Me: "You lied to me."
Husband: "Well, I'm still on my way to therapy, I just had to stop to eat."
Me: "If you are out to eat, tell me you are out to eat, not driving."

I don't care if the topic is as benign as eating fast food or as serious as infidelity. Lying by omission is a real thing.

From my boundary list...


I have a right to honesty in my marriage.

What this means…No lying or keeping secrets or half-truths. No omitting information for any reason. Communicating openly and truthfully. Calling to tell me if/why you will be late coming home for any reason. No secret email accounts, chat accounts, cell phone numbers, texts, or phone calls. 

Husband will be sleeping in another bedroom, right after I had just started feeling more safe in his presence. It seems silly to get upset over something like this after all we've been through. But dishonesty, no matter how meaningless, pushes the reset button on my feelings of safety in his company.

I'm angry, sad, and fearful. I need to pull out my recovery tool kit and pray for guidance.

And some support from blog land would help, too. I'm learning to ask for things when I need them.

4 comments:

  1. I am so sorry!

    Rhyll Croshaw wrote a book called "What Can I Do About Me?" and in it she describes a situation where her husband crossed a TINY boundary and she had to enforce the consequence even though it felt small and tiny in some ways and she felt like he was making so much progress. It reminds me of the way you described it here. Way to stick to your boundary!!! I'm proud of you!

    Also, I totally agree. Withholding information is lying.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I agree! With holding is lying! Good job being brave! I'm sorry!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Thanks MM and Harriet. It seems so silly to feel unsafe after something so meaningless after dealing with much bigger issues, but withholding is lying. Thanks for the support!

    ReplyDelete
  4. lying isn't a little thing. you go with that boundary. because you do have a right took honesty in marriage.

    ReplyDelete