The bitter [betrayed spouse]

[sweet_pea]

I don't come on here nearly as much as I did when I was closer to my infidelity saga (and that's another update for another day), but I saw a post which characterized the BS as "bitter." This lead me to think & wonder:

 

What makes a BS bitter?

 

Why do APs/WS' call the BS bitter?

 

Are BS' not allowed to be "bitter" considering the crap they are put through?

 

Does it annoy anyone else when the BS is bitter?

[drifter777]

Annoy me? Why on earth would someone else's suffering annoy anyone? Except maybe their WS.

 

My personal opinion is that a bitter BS is very angry with themselves for not divorcing WS. The fact that they stayed - whatever the reason - eats at them because they know that they simply gave WS a pass. There was no punishment for WS so their marriage is not just tarnished, it's also out of balance. It's not fair.

[wmacbride]

I don't come on here nearly as much as I did when I was closer to my infidelity saga (and that's another update for another day), but I saw a post which characterized the BS as "bitter." This lead me to think & wonder:

 

What makes a BS bitter?

 

Why do APs/WS' call the BS bitter?

 

Are BS' not allowed to be "bitter" considering the crap they are put through?

 

Does it annoy anyone else when the BS is bitter?

 

People who use this term, at least in my experience, are usually trying to salve their wounded ego by running down someone else, especially when they are jealous of them. It's easier to call someone else bitter than accept any sort of responsibility that you played a hand in making them that way.

 

I'm always a bit chagrined when I see a ow/om use that term about the bs in their situation, especially since they played a 50 percent role in causing them pain.

 

Are bs really bitter? Sure, I bet some are. Once bitten, twice shy.

[somanymistakes]

I think a BS has every right to be bitter and if I think one is, that's not a judgment against them as a person but more a note that their own experiences are potentially distorting the way they see things and the advice they give.

 

I know I personally carry some serious issues regarding fathers not being there for their kids and I try to make that clear when I post about that, because I know my own anger and resentment is heavily affecting my viewpoint. But I'll still completely flip out when certain subjects are raised, like when people start suggesting DNA-testing their kids to humiliate their spouses, I am not able to be rational about it.

 

Seriously if a whirlwind of disaster came in and wrecked their marriage, or even just made a huge mess of it that they had to clean up, wouldn't most people be pretty bitter about it, at least for a while?

[AlwaysGrowing]

I don't come on here nearly as much as I did when I was closer to my infidelity saga (and that's another update for another day), but I saw a post which characterized the BS as "bitter." This lead me to think & wonder:

 

What makes a BS bitter?

 

Why do APs/WS' call the BS bitter?

 

Are BS' not allowed to be "bitter" considering the crap they are put through?

 

Does it annoy anyone else when the BS is bitter?

 

Lets be honest, that phrasing was meant to diminish the posts that this poster felt were from BS.

 

 

Are there some bitter BS here... absolutely. Are most? No.

 

Those that attach bitter to BS posts says much more about their own headspace than those that they have labeled.

[aileD]

Lets be honest, that phrasing was meant to diminish the posts that this poster felt were from BS.

 

 

Are there some bitter BS here... absolutely. Are most? No.

 

Those that attach bitter to BS posts says much more about their own headspace than those that they have labeled.

 

This....this

[Arieswoman]

wmcbride nails it here;

 

People who use this term, at least in my experience, are usually trying to salve their wounded ego by running down someone else, especially when they are jealous of them. It's easier to call someone else bitter than accept any sort of responsibility that you played a hand in making them that way.

 

Exactly - it's a put-down used by WS's to try and make out that there's something emotionally wrong with the BS.

The fact of the matter is that there is something emotionally wrong with the BS, who's had their head screwed with by lying and gaslighting from the WS for weeks, maybe months. It's called PTSD.

[sweet_pea]

**Edit: the last question in my post should say "does it annoy anyone else when the BS is called bitter" lol thats what i get for quick posts

[aileD]

Of course we are bitter. We were betrayed by the last person in the world who we would expect to betray us. And another woman helped him do it. I understand the OW has no responsibility to my marriage but don't they have a general responsibility to be a decent person and respect boundaries?

 

Don't answer that because it's already been said and done and there will never be a consensus and I don't want to thread jack

[William]

The discussion isn't about other LoveShack members or groups of members, as that is disallowed, much as some factions of members here would and do enjoy the politics of it.

 

The thread is about:

 

What makes a BS bitter?

 

Why do APs/WS' call the BS bitter?

 

Are BS' not allowed to be "bitter" considering the crap they are put through?

 

Does it annoy anyone else when the BS is bitter?

 

Feel free to share your real life experiences regarding the topic. Thanks!

[HeartbrokenDec29]

Oh please....Alot of personal definitions of why people say the BS is bitter!

 

There is no special sentiments about it or is there any special meaning to it... bitter simply means as provided by google "(of people or their feelings or behavior) angry, hurt, or resentful because of one's bad experiences or a sense of unjust treatment." Bitter is an emotion.

 

Of course all betrayed spouse are bitter whether or not they express it because theyhave indeed gone through a bad experience. Even the other woman is bitter as well whether or not she chose the affair or not.

 

Now whether or not they are allowed to be is a different case. Everyone is free to feel any emotion based on their experience.

 

Saying someone is bitter does not mean a deflection of wrong doing or ego projection. It is simply a state of being after certain experiences.

 

At the end of the day everyone is bitter in an affair!

[Giggle]

I wasn't bitter until the new woman felt the need to be all mothery to my kid when "they" dropped him off, when I knew she had signed away her parental rights to her kids. Then I got a bit snarly.

[BluesPower]

Yeah I am bitter, for sure...

 

I am bitter that she had two affairs, for no good reason. I was a great husband in those days. She, as I came to learn, was never ever remorseful about anything she had ever done. Not in any way. I was the problem, because I was controlling...What a joke.

 

I am bitter that she was a drug addict for 20 out of 26 years of marriage.

 

I am most bitter that she never loved me, no matter how great a guy I was.

 

But I am most bitter at myself for not divorcing her sooner. One again, all the stupid ideas that I had about duty, honor, marriage and all that. All of that led me to stay and raise my kids, which I could have done alone. Which as it turned out I was mostly a single dad anyway.

 

I am bitter because I was a fool...

[Babsinhealing]

I recently used the word "bitter" in one of my posts so I'm thinking maybe you were referencing my comment. Please allow me to justify. As others have pointed out- I would never say a BS is not rightly justified to feel bitter and I never intentionally intended to annoy anyone. I was using it in the context that I feel many of the BS that post "angry or resentful" response comments in the OW threads tend to do it from a place of bitterness. They really can't understand the mindset of a wayward so they tend to project a lot of anger and bitterness. Whether it's bitterness towards the OW/WS, the fact their life imploded, the fact they lost blind trust or whatever the case may be for that individual. I agree with wholeheartedly with another poster... it was more about referencing an emotion and nothing to do with being derogatory towards a BS.

[Mrs. John Adams]

Betrayed spouses have every right to be bitter.

 

Their trusted spouse betrayed them ..

 

No one asked them their opinion

 

So I can totally understand why they might be bitter...why they question everything...why they might analyze everything...why they question thier relationship with their spouse.

 

As a matter of fact..I am amazed that any betrayed spouse can reconcile at all.

[Mrs. John Adams]

I absolutely think betrayed people can become bitter. They don't even need to have ever been married. In my experience, most single people past 28 or so are bitter to differing degrees. So many failed relationships, some cheaters, some ghosters, liars, everything. All of that can lead to some bitterness.

 

people can certainlly become bitter for different reasons

 

but betrayal....infidelity...is a completely different level

[Arieswoman]

To go back to Sweet Pea's original questions;

 

Does it annoy anyone else when the BS is bitter?

 

Yes, it annoys the WS because it's a reminder of their bad behaviour.

[Furious]

I don't come on here nearly as much as I did when I was closer to my infidelity saga (and that's another update for another day), but I saw a post which characterized the BS as "bitter." This lead me to think & wonder:

 

What makes a BS bitter?

 

Why do APs/WS' call the BS bitter?

 

Are BS' not allowed to be "bitter" considering the crap they are put through?

 

Does it annoy anyone else when the BS is bitter?

 

 

I just find that phrase as deflection from taking any ownership of an AP's action and character.

 

Usually, unless the AP was deceived that the person they became involved with someone who claimed to be single, the Ap knowingly enters into the affair.

 

Ironic how so many knowingly AP's are bitter and moan about how they feel betrayed by their married AP.

 

SMH

[cocorico]

While BS are often caricatured as being bitter, not all are. Thinking of the BS I know IRL, some have never been bitter (hurt, yes; disappointed, certainly; but bitter? Certainly not all) and others have been bitter for a period, and then moved on. I think because the period of being bitter is likely to coincide with the need to vent about their experiences, LS is more likely to attract BS in the bitter period, and so feed the stereotype. Because proportionately few of the FBS hang about here, displaying "post-bitterness" phases, it's easy to forget that for many / most BS, there is very much life after the bitterness.

 

Of course, not all BS / FBS make it past the bitterness. My mother never did. Nor, AFAIK, has my H's XBW - though she's showing signs of starting to move on, so I do hold out hope. But thinking about my mother as an example of a BS that didn't move on, and who stayed bitter:

 

What makes a BS bitter?

 

In my mother's case, it was the recognition that she was replaceable in my father's affections. She had strong narcissistic traits, and had been unfaithful herself (my older sibling was conceived of during infidelity, though she denied that to her death). But the thought that my father might seek - and find - love elsewhere was too much for her to tolerate. It was such an ego blow that she simply could not recover.

 

In my H's xW's case, I think similar factors were at play. She expected to be the centre, and when the focus shifted, she was unable to understand how that was even possible.

 

Why do APs/WS' call the BS bitter?

 

Neither my father nor his W ever called my mother bitter. They expressed sadness at her inability to move on, and her continued self-sabotage, when others mentioned this to them, but they didn't engage.

 

My H has likewise resisted when his family speak of the xW. They certainly call her bitter - my SIL has had the misfortune of several encounters since xW moved into her neighbourhood, and xW's behaviour has raised many eyebrows there. I guess the roots of the label are behaviour that is

1) unwilling to let go of the hurt and disappointment, wallowing in self-pity and drawing attention to how wronged she was / feels;

2) inability to live in the present, and a constant need to relate everything back to the past - specifically, the infidelity - as though that was the only moment of significance in her whole life;

3) a refusal to take ownership or responsibility for anything, past or present, and a need to blame everything on the infidelity - even things that preceded the infidelity, or things directly attributable to her own prior infidelity - and a learned helplessness declaring that the infidelity has doomed her to be thus in perpetuity;

4) a sense of entitlement, that she somehow warranted having it all her way, that made someone else's choices (to engage in infidelity) such an inconceivable outrage that simply can't be processed.

 

Are BS' not allowed to be "bitter" considering the crap they are put through?

 

Everyone is allowed to respond as they wish, within the confines of the law. But equally, everyone else is allowed to respond to the BS response as they see fit, too. And while sympathy may be forthcoming in the wake of the infidelity, sustained bitterness over years, even decades, is unlikely to sustain sympathy. At some point, people do expect others (rightly or wrongly) to get on with it - and if someone insists in wallowing in misery, others are likely to run out of patience and simply move on.

 

Does it annoy anyone else when the BS is bitter?

 

It annoys those trying to provide support if a BS clings to bitterness and insists on clothing themselves in it every day, for the rest of their lives. Few people seek out those shrouded in negative energy, and if people feel their best efforts to support someone are being wilfully thwarted because someone has fashioned a new identity out of being The Wronged Spouse, they're likely to lose patience and move away.

[sweet_pea]

To go back to Sweet Pea's original questions;

 

 

 

Yes, it annoys the WS because it's a reminder of their bad behaviour.

 

That question was worded incorrectly- it was supposed to say if it annoyed anyone else when the BS is called bitter but I still concur with this post lol

[seren]

Before I answered I had a look at what Bitter meant. The version I most recognised was the one that said anger, resentment, rage and, in the early days after D Day I can say, yes, I felt all those as well as disappointment, sadness, feeling sick, lost etc etc. Did that last? no, not for very long, not all of it. Anger is so, so tiring and if a couple reconcile resentment cannot be the key emotion otherwise it can never take place.

 

I would be very surprised if any BS said that on D Day and in the month's after they shrugged their shoulders, thought ah well and skipped off without any residual feelings of loss. Sharing your life with someone, making plans, loving, raising a family, making plans and thinking they feel the same is a wonderful thing, finding out the other has been living an alternative version of this messes with anyone's head and if after finding out the BS was lied to and that there had been another then who can blame them (us) if they howl at the moon, wish all manner of bad things for the AP and feel let down and more than a little pissed off.

 

I would imagine people call the BS bitter is because they haven't wore her or his shoes, before my H had an affair I had all manner of different thoughts about how someone should manage it, should cope, process and move along. I might even have used the word bitter if after a year a BS, finding herself alone after 30 years, two children, a house she has to sell, a future she hadn't planned as they had planned a different one together, a million and one changes she h or he hadn't expected to have to make because the WS had an affair, was still not moving on. No one can prepare for how an affair blows up the marital world. If they feel angry, resentment and some call it bitter because to say all the other words has to include the words betrayed, cheated, discarded and they are all words that put the reasons for the BS feelings back onto the WS and that is a blame thing rather than an emotion. If that makes sense.

 

I would imagine seeing grief, loss, anger on a daily basis stymies reconciling, prevents the WS, if they have left, being able to draw a nice neat line under the affair, no one wants to face that they have taken a huge role in causing a family to break up, children to resent them, the loss of the married relationship that was';t handled properly. A lot of BS ask, why not just say they were unhappy? because that would involve confrontation and a lot of people avoid conflict at all costs. Far easier to call a BS bitter than to look at themselves and realise they are the reason the BS feels so damned awful.

 

At some point there would, hopefully be the time the BS can move forward, it takes as long as it takes. If people want to call it bitterness, it doesn't alter things, no one knows how they will deal with betrayal until they have been themselves. It was sobering for me, I never expected it and I dealt with it far differently from how I imagined.