Conscience keeps more people awake than coffee. ~Author Unknown

Conscience keeps more people awake than coffee. ~Author Unknown

The last week I have been working on the feelings of shame and regret in my past~

Most notable is the shame I feel about the relationship I had with my son's father.

When he came back into my life 2 years ago, my heart swelled with the love I had for him, love I had stuffed away because he belonged to someone else. As he and I entered back into a relationship, I set aside my feelings of knowing it was wrong, of knowing that I was hurting other people by having the relationship, all the time believing that because I loved him it was all ok.
Recently he and I had a chat~ during the chat he said "what do I want? doesn't matter I was just a dirty afair that you are ashamed of."

The emotional response I had from that line from him showed me something ~

Yes I am ashamed of the affair he and I had. You see, by my allowing the affair to happen, I failed to live up to my expectations of myself. I was weak and instead of walking away from a MARRIED man, I engaged in an active sexual relationship with him. I reeked havoc on his family. His wife, his children, his grandchildren all suffered because I did not do the right thing. This has caused not just guilt but shame~

During the affair, we concieved this little boy. I am full of guilt that my son will have to grow up being divided between two homes. I find myself regreting that I had the affair that brought him into this world because he will have to suffer his entire life because of it.

It brings to mind Exodus 34:5-7 Then the LORD came down in the cloud and stood there with him and proclaimed his name, the LORD. And he passed in front of Moses, proclaiming, "The LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation."

The children are punished~ they have to suffer the consequences of their parents actions. I think about my sons future...

He will certainly be loved and dotted on by both his father and myself. He will also have siblings that love him. But forever, his life will be affected by the sins of his parents. He will never know what it is like to have both of his parents living in the same home. He will learn someday that his Daddy was married to his Step Mother when he was concieved. He will have to find his own way to deal with the fact that his Daddy stayed with his Step Mother after he was conceived and born.

Although I will be able to tell my son that I loved his Daddy and that both Mommy and Daddy love him, he will know that Daddy didn't really love Mommy. He will have to work through this in his own way and I feel so guilty that this will be something he has to deal with.

The guilt goes on to my daughter, conceived by a single sex act with a man that was not someone I would have been sexually interested in under normal conditions, but on one single occassion, reached out to me at a time when I wanted and needed someone to hold me and make me feel safe for even just a little while, and he did that. A single sex act and here is this adorable little girl that is such a blessing to my life, but still...

She has no idea who her father is. I feel shame that she was concieved in the way she was, that she does not and never will know her biological father. To make things worse, I allowed her to call my sons father Daddy. She loves this man. And now he isn't part of her life. So she will have to grow up dealing with not knowing her biological and losing the man she called and loved as Daddy. She will have to watch as "Daddy" takes her brother off to do things and she is left behind...

So much wrong done to my children because I was so stupid...

Today I am trying to learn to get out from under the shame. The guilt I can live with... it will help me NOT make the same mistakes in the future and help me protect myself and my children from me getting into another relationship that is not good for them or me. The shame... that is another story.

I sit here and think about what my son's father said~ the comment about me being ashamed of our affair. I do want to get over the SHAME I feel over our relationship. I don't know how to right now. I wish I had his ability to justify the relationship we had, the damage we did to so many lives.

I am working on it. If for no other reason than I want my children to NOT feel ashamed... They did nothing wrong, no matter how screwed up their Mom made things...