Forgive *AND* Forget?

One thing I read, I think it might have been from Maya Angelou, was that forgiveness is something you do for yourself. Meaning, you forgive those who have wronged you so that you can have peace within yourself.

My dad used to say hate was a waste of emotions and it's better to let it go.

To forgive and forget...how do ever forget? Even during or after the forgiveness process it is so hard to forget and to just completely move past it in everything from your thoughts to your actions to your words.

I've been hurting. I've been working on forgiving. But every now and then the snidest of snide comments escapes my lips and before I know it, I've contributed to making the situation worse rather than making it better.

And then I feel bad for making him feel bad but eventually I think, "Fuck it, he made me feel bad too, he can deal with it." But continuing the hurt and trying to hurt each other can never help.

I told him I didn't know how much more forgiveness I could give. That if anything else ever happened again, that would be the end. But words are just words and no matter how blue in the face you get just speaking them, the actions required to follow through with the words and the somewhat "empty threats" are challenging.

And you hope with all your might that the threat works, that next time he will think about the consequences before he acts. I told him to always assume I will find out, because I will. I also had him read Dr. Phil's website so that we could talk about boundaries. We agreed with Dr. Phil to make our definition of cheating anything you wouldn't otherwise do if your spouse was standing right beside you. So the emails, the text messages, the phone calls...if he wouldn't do them with me looking over his shoulder, that is cheating.