"I know you are feeling the pain of guilt and confusion. I understand
that you wish all this never happened and that you wish it would just go away. I can even believe that you truly love me and
that your indiscretion hurts you emotionally much the same way it hurts me. I understand your apprehension to me discovering
little by little, everything that led up to your indiscretion, everything that happened during that weekend, and everything
that happened afterwards.
I understand. No one wants to have a mistake or misjudgment
thrown in his or her face repeatedly. No one wants to be forced to "look" at the thing that caused all their pain over and
over again. I can actually see, that through your eyes, you are viewing this whole thing as something that just needs to go
away, something that is over, that she doesn't mean anything to you, so why is it such a big issue? I can understand you wondering
why I torture myself with this continuously, and thinking, doesn't she know by now that I love her? I can see how you can
feel this way and how frustrating it must be. But for the remainder of this letter I'm going to ask you to view my reality
through my eyes.
"You were there. There is no detail left out from your point of
view. Like a puzzle, you have all the pieces and you are able to reconstruct them and be able to understand the whole picture,
the whole message, or the whole meaning. You know exactly what that picture is and what it means to you and if it can effect
your life and whether or not it continues to stir your feelings. You have the pieces, the tools, and the knowledge. You can
move through your life with 100% of the picture you compiled. If you have any doubts, then at least you're carrying all the
information in your mind and you can use it to derive conclusions or answers to your doubts or question. You carry all the
"STUFF" to figure out OUR reality. There isn't really any information, or pieces to the puzzle that you don't have.
"Now let's enter my reality. Let's both agree that this affects
our lives equally. The outcome no matter what it is will affect us both. Our future and our present circumstances are every
bit as important to me as it is to you. So, why then is it okay for me to be left in the dark? Do I not deserve to know as
much about the night that nearly destroyed our relationship as you do? Just like you, I am also able to discern the meaning
of certain particulars and innuendoes of that night and just like you, I deserve to be given the opportunity to understand
what nearly brought our relationship down. To assume that I can move forward and accept everything at face value is unrealistic
and unless we stop thinking unrealistically I doubt our lives well ever "feel" complete. You have given me a puzzle. It is
a 1000 piece puzzle and 400 random pieces are missing. You expect me to assemble the puzzle without the benefit of looking
at the picture on the box. You expect me to be able to discern what I am looking at and to appreciate it in the same context
as you. You want me to be as comfortable with what I see in the picture as you are. When I ask if there was a tree in such
and such area of the picture you tell me don't worry about it, it's not important. When I ask whether there were any animals
in my puzzle you say don't worry about it, it's not important. When I ask if there was a lake in that big empty spot in my
puzzle you say, what's the difference, it's not important.
Then later when I'm expected to "understand" the picture in
my puzzle you fail to understand my disorientation and confusion. You expect me to feel the same way about the picture as
you do but deny me the same view as you. When I express this problem you feel compelled to admonish me for not understanding
it, for not seeing it the way you see it. You wonder why I can't just accept whatever you chose to describe to me about the
picture and then be able to feel the same way you feel about it.
"So, you want me to be okay with everything. You think you deserve
to know and I deserve to wonder. You may honestly feel that the whole picture, everything that happened is insignificant because
in your heart you know it was a mistake and wish it never happened. But how can I know that? Faith? Because you told me so?
Would you have faith if the tables were turned? Don't you understand that I want to believe you completely? But how can I?
I can never know what is truly in your mind and heart. I can only observe your actions, and what information I have acquired
and slowly, over time rebuild my faith in your feelings. I truly wish it were easier.
"So, there it is, as best as I can put it. That is why I ask
questions. That is where my need to know is derived from. And that is why it is unfair for you to think that we can effectively
move forward and unfair for you to accuse me of dwelling on the past. My need to know stems from my desire to hold our world
together. It doesn't come from jealousy, it doesn't come from spitefulness, and it doesn't come from a desire to make you
suffer. It comes from the fact that I love you. Why else would I put myself through this? Wouldn't it be easier for me to
walk away? Wouldn't it be easier to consider our relationship a bad mistake in my life and to move on to better horizons?
Of course it would, but I can't and the reason I can't is because I love you and that reason in itself makes all the difference
in the world."
