# Is it possible to love a liar?



## WhereAmI (Nov 3, 2010)

( Holy long post, Batman! To sum it up, husband lies often but has been faithful as far as I know- feel free to skip to the last paragraph.)

I've been married to my husband for five years, been together for nine. We have three children.

For the past three years things have been pretty rocky. He lies often, usually involving females. He wants everyone to think the world of him, even if what they're thinking is far from the truth. I expect him to make mistakes, but lying is something that has always bothered me. I've shown him multiple times that I can handle the truth. For example, I asked him if he thought anyone he worked with was attractive (He works with some very beautiful women) and after a little teasing he finally ended up admitting that he found one of them attractive. Cool, right? I figure if he's honest with me there's nothing to worry about. He's also told me I was gaining a bit of weight, something that we agreed needed to be said if it was ever a problem. I've lost most of the weight and he's handed me the "no longer fat card." LOL I am not fragile, but I can't handle lies.

There was a point in our relationship, after our move from NE to FL, where he just completely shut down. I'd try to talk to him about things, but multiple times I heard "I just don't care!" He had never talked to me like that and it continued for a long time. I said repeatedly that I was unhappy and thought the only way I'd be happy was to leave. I put together a plan to make it back to NE . It wasn't until I showed him my concrete plans that he wanted to change. Initially he was upset because I "never tried to talk to him about it". Honestly, this man will lie to me about things that happened right in front of my face. I just don't get it! His attitude became slightly better, but the lies continued.

The latest lie happened in November. Things had been so bad with the lies that I knew I couldn't handle talking to him on the phone while he was gone. I KNEW I'd want to question him and that I'd be suspicious. I told him before he left that I'd rather not talk while he was gone. He sent a text to me anyway saying that he'd call me as soon as he got to the hotel at 5pm. He never called. I sent him a text around 9pm that said, "I'm shutting off my phone. Hope you made it to the hotel okay!" and left it at that. Honestly, if he wasn't going to do anything wrong during the trip I didn't want to ruin it for him. If he was going to do something wrong, who am I to stop him? I can't control my husband and most importantly I don't want to.

While he was gone I checked who he was talking to on the phone. There was a female he was texting with from midnight to 1am on two of the nights. The night I discovered this I was a wreck, crying my heart out and thinking the worst. The rest of the week that he was gone was like heaven. I just felt... like me. Anyway, when he came home I asked to see his phone and he handed it right over. Before I opened the phone I asked him twice if he deleted anything. He said no. I went through his texts and they were not there. I asked him again and he STILL lied to me.
Me: "So, who's SF (the girl who he was texting)?"
Him: "Who?"
Me: "SF"
Him: "Oh, she works with Dr. BlahBlah"
Me: "That's not why I'm asking you. She's the girl whose texts you chose to delete. Who is she to you?"
Him: "No one! I swear! She just started texting me and I didn't know how she got my phone number. I didn't know how to explain to you how she got my phone number so I got scared and deleted it!"

He cried and all that jazz. I just don't know who he is anymore. I asked him why he didn't just call me and say, "I'm worried that you'll view this situation oddly and I wanted to explain." He said he felt like an ass for not thinking of that and started crying harder. He said he'd tell me every single thing that happened on the trip. He was seriously ready to give me a play by play. He went to different places alone with different females (including the one he finds attractive) and I told him I wasn't interested in that. He asked me why. I let him know it was because he didn't try to hide anything about these girls from me. I was only concerned about SF. It seemed to FINALLY hit him that it's the lies that are the problem. He said he hardly knows the girl. They were supposedly texting back and forth to get their separate labs together. On FB she posted a picture of him on the beach (other people were there in other pics) and another with two of his friends. She labeled that one, "Three of my favorites!" Now, it's completely plausible that my husband isn't one of her favorites, but those other two guys are. I suppose it would be rude to say, "Two of my favorites and some other guy!" I guess I buy his story.

He's only lied to me once since then. Actually he made up something bad so that I'd think he was telling me the truth about everything, but came clean the next night about making up the lie. What the frick?

The problem is me. I know I'm happier when he's gone. I love him, he has great qualities, and I really want to keep my family together. I just can't trust him. It's so hard to be in love with him. We can have lots of fun together, I'm just not in love with him anymore. I really don't feel like I know who he is. This affects my happiness greatly. I've spent years trying to fix things about myself in hopes that he'll want to start telling me the truth. I finally realize that nothing I do can make him change. It has to be him. I'm not mean about the things that have happened and I don't bring them up often. We'll start having a conversation about something that involves a future for us and I just can't get into it. He often forgets that I feel the way I do because I'm not constantly bring up our issues. Should I be? Is there anything I can do to make this work? Or even to keep me sane while he works on his issues? Living with my husband without being in love with him is so difficult.


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## nice777guy (Nov 23, 2009)

Sounds like a bit of a mess.

Not admitting you find a co-worker attractive sounds reasonable.

Texting another woman after midnight while you are away from home, then lying when asked about it - not reasonable.

As for love, I've always thought it was a verb, not a noun. Its the way we treat each other - not just how we feel.

I see no real reason your marriage can't be saved if you both want to work on things.


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## WhereAmI (Nov 3, 2010)

nice777guy said:


> Sounds like a bit of a mess.
> *
> Not admitting you find a co-worker attractive sounds reasonable.*
> 
> ...


He admitted that he found her attractive, and I was okay with that. Sorry if I wasn't clear. I was trying to show that I'm not the jealous type - there's no reason to lie. 

I still treat him like my husband. I cuddle with him, touch him often, still have sex. We can have a great time. I just don't feel the love. I want to WANT to be with him. That's probably confusing. Sigh...


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## nice777guy (Nov 23, 2009)

WhereAmI said:


> He admitted that he found her attractive, and I was okay with that. Sorry if I wasn't clear. I was trying to show that I'm not the jealous type - there's no reason to lie.
> 
> I still treat him like my husband. I cuddle with him, touch him often, still have sex. We can have a great time. I just don't feel the love. I want to WANT to be with him. That's probably confusing. Sigh...


I'm reading A LOT into your situation and what you are writing - long marriage - you aren't "in love" - late night texting. Sounds like both of you are at risk to look outside the marriage right now. Once that happens, putting Humpty back together again gets a lot harder.

Do something now - a romantic vacation, marriage counseling, ballroom dancing lessons - to get closer again before you get any farther apart.


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## major misfit (Oct 17, 2010)

It might be possible to love a liar, but it sure makes it hard to trust one. For me personally, trust is the foundation to any relationship. That goes for any personal relationship. I just can't be in any relationship where I can't trust the person.


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## greenpearl (Sep 3, 2010)

major misfit said:


> trust is the foundation to any relationship. That goes for any personal relationship. I just can't be in any relationship where I can't trust the person.


Agree! 

It's not possible to love a liar! 

If we lie about small things, we lie about big things. 

There is no trust. 

A lot of marriages fail because there is little trust. Hiding money from each other, hiding secrets from each other, etc etc, just destroys the trust. 

A couple won't be able to be comfortable physically when there is little trust, that means physical intimacy is gone, without physical intimacy in a marriage, the marriage is gone....................NO LOVE!


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