When Trust Breaks Twice: The Silent Trauma of Long Marriages

If I have to name the hurt, it is called betrayal. And the ramifications are nothing less than the upheaval of my existence. Suddenly, I was questioning my self-worth and doubting my sanity.

Married to a man I loved, I never considered that my trust was misplaced. Trust was part of our DNA — the very fabric of my marriage. Of course, my husband loved me. And of course, he would never do anything to jeopardize the life we were building. We had goals. Simple goals: a happy, healthy life for ourselves and our children. Who wouldn’t want that for themselves, their children, or their partner?

I believed in us. I trusted him innately. Innately is a new-ish word in my lexicon. My friend Rebecca described it to me: that’s what relationships are built on. When we enter into a relationship, we trust our partner innately. We cannot envision them doing anything that would put our health and happiness at risk.

And I suppose in most long marriages, there comes a moment when that innate trust is shattered, and we make the decision to proceed forward with our joined lives despite the break. Our emotions are crushed, but we are invested. We make a conscious decision to continue our journey with our partner.

It’s called the Sunk Cost Fallacy. According to a Google search: “the phenomenon whereby a person is reluctant to abandon a strategy or course of action because they have invested heavily in it, even when it is clear that abandonment would be more beneficial.”

We convince ourselves that we can still achieve our goals with this person. We substitute learned trust for innate trust — the kind that comes from years of living side by side.

For thirty years, I carried blame that was never mine to carry.

After all, these trust-breakers were present during some tough times: raising children (which is never easy), facing health issues, weathering career changes, and enduring economic downturns. We weathered those obstacles together; surely, we could weather this too. We assume the life we’ve built together is fundamentally safe.

But later, something changes. The foundation upon which we stood — or as I prefer to say, the coordinate plane upon which my life was built — shifted. A moment came when I looked at my husband and suddenly understood: he was not the man I knew. I was facing a stranger. Who is this person? My concept of my life, myself, my universe, shattered.

Gasping and slack-jawed, my new reality came into view. Facts are facts: my life was gone. My life never existed. Am I that stupid? Why is this happening? How am I going to take care of my children?

I shouted at myself: It’s not just the children, you idiot, it’s the family. That man is part of the family. Oh my God, I have an obligation to him. I can’t just walk away. Someone has to clean up this mess, and it ain’t gonna be him.

He promised and promised. We cried. He assured me it would be okay. "This is fixable.” God help me, I so wanted to believe him. I wanted to trust him and let him solve this dilemma.

But I’d been down this road before. When would I take off the fogged lenses and start to see clearly? For decades I told myself I had too much invested in this marriage to throw it away. Sunk Cost Fallacy at work.

I told myself I was strong enough to make this work. If he stepped up, we could continue to build. And sometimes he did. He stepped up for a short time, gave just enough to set me at ease. But then came another hurt. I was such a schmuck.

I stayed in the marriage for years longer than I should have — years of tears, conversations, and excuses. Sadly, my case is not unique. Many of us — men and women — choose to stay. In my case, I wish I had been braver. I wish I had recognized the signs that we weren’t getting closer. We blamed his depression, his anxiety, his thyroid disorder. But still, he lied and deceived me. And I foolishly believed these were minor blips. “We are healing,” I told myself. “It’ll get better. He loves me. He promised me.” But now, with hindsight, I wonder if he ever loved me at all.

Learned trust doesn’t flow. It requires effort. It requires forgiveness. And for me, it required a belief in the goodness of the man I loved. The emotional labor required to hold our life together was exhausting. I developed an autoimmune disorder, tachycardia, high blood pressure. I was dying.

And the negative self-talk wasn’t helpful. Feelings of worthlessness overwhelmed me. The man I loved was cruel and dishonest, and I foolishly trusted him.

This is the double wound of long marriages that end in betrayal: the loss of the partner, and the loss of faith in your own discernment. The trauma lingers and lingers and lingers.

Immediately after my separation, I was a mental mess. When describing myself to friends, I’d say, “My brain is soup.” I couldn’t hold a coherent thought in my head, and I couldn’t stop crying.

Leaving wasn’t the end of my story; it was the beginning of finally living.

The PTSD was obvious. My friend Peggy described me as “raw.” Every time I considered trusting again — anyone, even myself — the memory of broken trust, both innate and learned, rushed back at me, howling and screaming.

After years of self-help, support groups, and endless journaling, here’s the truth I wish someone had told me sooner: I didn’t fail by forgiving. I didn’t fail by trying to save my marriage and keep my family intact. And I did not stay because I was weak. I was strong. So fucking strong. But I was not brave. If I had been brave, I would have left sooner.

Research suggests the real healing begins with learning to trust yourself — to trust your intuition. Although we are damaged, we must learn to trust ourselves again and know that we can move forward.

That is where freedom begins.