Can someone please explain to me what a safe partner means?
This can be tricky when you are only 2 months out, but I'll give it a try
Off the top of my head, the safety issue is about TRAUMA. Learning your spouse has had an A is a TRAUMATIC experience. And it's traumatic on many levels. I did not think it was humanly possible to experience such pain without dying. I am a highly educated, well respected professional. Reading is an essential part of my job, and I've been an avid reader for pleasure as well - for my entire life. Yet, I'm in year 4 and still have tremendous difficulty reading on paper (I can do audiobooks). I was suicidal for nearly 2 years after dday. I had NEVER self harmed and could never understand the fixation with "cutting", yet w/in months of dday I put lit cigarettes out on my body, because the pain of that was a RELIEF from the emotional pain of my WH's infidelity (something that still shocks me to this day). There was a point about 3 months in where my abdomen and thighs were covered with burns. I wouldn't be surprised if there was not a single day for the first YEAR that I did not cry - there is no question I cried more in the 1st 6 months after dday than I had during the 50+ years since I'd learned to walk & talk. I'm someone who just doesn't cry and I would spend HOURS - literally - bawling like a toddler, snot and saliva everywhere... sometimes until the sun came up.
So- that's a snippet of what the pain of trauma can be. But that's not the end of it. When we experience a traumatic event, our "lizard brain" (the amygdala, the nervous system, etc) goes on high effing alert. Neuroscientists say that trauma can actually change our DNA. It changes our wiring. This is primal/biological. Think to the caveman days - we see tiger and then tiger kills our buddy, and we learn: stay the F away from those things. Keep your distance. They are not safe. And then that memory is stored (just like when we are toddlers and put our hands on the hot stove - it burns us and we don't do that anymore). With most traumatic experiences, we are able to remove ourselves from the source of the trauma while we heal, and then gradually -or maybe not at all - find ways to return to that source (eg we get bit by a dog, it can take awhile - and sometimes never - before we can feel "safe" around ANY dog again). But with infidelity, we are living with the source of the trauma. Which is confusing AF, because we also LOVE the source of the trauma.
All of that is still just the tip of the iceberg.
Meanwhile, the WS is mired in shame. And unless/until that can be managed, it's a position of selfishness- the EXACT same thing that goes into choosing an A. So, another layer of confusion bc a BS may want to know their WS is ashamed, want to know the WS understands how effed up their choices were. Yet, shame is a form of pure self absorption - it's all "about" the person experiencing it. It's not supportive of the BS or the BS' pain and trauma response (which is, to a degree, where the yelling, etc comes from - it's a response to trauma), and I think a BS instinctively knows this. so - we both want the WS to feel the shame and we don't want the WS to be self absorbed - creates a nice tidy conundrum there. AND, the BS may also have their own shame - ashamed they were so stupid to not see the A, ashamed they don't want to immediately D, ashamed they were somehow inadequate as a lover, a partner, a friend, etc or their WS wouldn't have cheated (and for those who experience this part, it's a form of control in that we tell ourselves if we were x or y or z it would not have happened so if we change then we can again be safe, when the reality is that A's really have NOTHING to do with the BS and everything to do with the WS). Now we have a BS with a well sized serving of shame ON TOP OF the trauma.
So- what does that mean to the WS? What does "safe" mean? I think it can mean different things to different BS. Personally, it starts with honesty, transparency, checking in, the things you describe (cellphone passwords, calling at lunch, etc). It also includes the WS having NO CONTACT with the AP (and you are working on that, but it's not a done deal). Frankly, those are the easy things. Then there is getting to the root of the WS' whys and hows - why and how did this become an acceptable course, and then changing it. That can take years.
Another example oft seen (including on SI) is the addiction/alcoholic analogy, in that one can be what is called a "dry drunk" - someone who is not drinking, but the same unhealthy coping skills/mechanisms are present. Someone who has not dug into their self examination (or the steps, for the 12-step folks) as to what triggers them, the underlying feelings, etc. Someone that still lies - and an alcoholic's lies (same as with a WS) begin with themselves (IOW, the alcoholic lies to themself LONG before they are lying to the rest of the world). It seems to me a LOT of WS think they are 'safe' bc they have ended their As. But in reality, ending the A is the EASY part. They are still not safe for their current or any future partner unless/until they figure out why they chose to cheat and HOW they became comfortable lying and living a secret sexual life and then CHANGING those behaviors.
And I've still not even mentioned empathy for the BS. Which for most WS is not present - IOW, if a WS was an empathetic person, it's hard to see how they would choose to cheat to begin with, bc they would see/know the damage to the other person. Brene Brown has a pretty quick you tube video on empathy (and she's the queen of shame research, so I think any WS or BS can get a ton of mileage by reading her books. Personally, I found an audio called the power of vulnerability on hooply via my local library that's about 6-8 hours comprised of a series of lectures - it's beyond what you'll find on YouTube and I highly recommend it). But finding the way to empathy - to be able to get on the ground with the person hurting without thinking of ourselves - is crucial to healing, and I don't see how it would be possible to R w/o it. My journey as a BS has prompted me to face some of my own really shitty behaviors -primarily WRT my kids - and honing the skills of empathy has been such an invaluable gift - to me and to them.
There is a podcast that is REALLY good at explaining the trauma, the need to establish trust, empathy, etc., called Helping Couples Heal. I highly recommend it for WS and BS alike. The hosts (and I think all of their guests) operate from the relational betrayal trauma model, that focuses (at first) on what the trauma is and how both the WS and BS can learn to manage the trauma response, to validate the pain, and to begin working on reestablishing trust. The most recent episode (from early March of this year) is an interview with Stan Tatkin and I think it synthesizes a lot of the concepts (IOW, it may be a good place to start, and if any of it resonates, then go back through the other episodes to see what may be of interest).
There is a book called 'cheating in a nutshell' that talks at length about the trauma of being a BS. I am VERY reluctant to even mention it, as I view the book as quite anti-R... or maybe the better way to say it is that the authors view R as requiring the BS to somehow stifle our lizard brain/natural wiring whose JOB is to protect us from harm (which as I've said, is kind of impossible when you are LIVING with the source of harm). So, I'm mentioning it because only you can know if you are at an emotional place that can handle reading a book with a lot of solid information about the trauma, but ALSO a lot of perspectives that may thwart a WS' (or a BS for that matter) hope for R (and I do not want to discount the need for hope, esp so early in your journey). While I am not in R, I disagree with the authors' negativity about R and absolutely DO believe that R is possible. So - it's up to you. The Body Keeps the Score by Bassel Van der Kolk is kind of the bible of trauma (not infidelity), but is another resource that may be helpful if you can view it through the lens of infidelity. That book was VERY helpful for me as a BS, but it is very long and very very very detailed, while the Nutshell is a more easily digestible synthesis that is specific to infidelity trauma.
And since you've already read how to help your spouse heal, you could also substitute their "successful rebuilders' language with 'safe' and IMHO be on a pretty good path to what 'safe' looks like.
Sorry if I've written a tome that doesn't help -
Godspeed.
[This message edited by gmc94 at 12:46 AM, April 14th, 2021 (Wednesday)]