Journey Into Hell (Part 3)

I got home from the hospital and vowed to 'fix' things. I was done lying. I was going to be the husband my wife deserved, a better dad to my kids. I came up with a game plan. I began reading - really reading - God's Word. For this one week, I didn't communicate with Laura other than to tell her I couldn't communicate. In my mind I was ready to break it off, I just didn't know how. Laura had tickets to visit me at a conference in February. I couldn't break it off before that. But I would.

My family came home. The next couple of weeks were tense. I left for my conference in mid-February and spent the entire time drinking and smoking and having sex with Laura. The first night I called to say goodnight to my kids and my wife knew immediately that I'd been drinking. She hung up and refused to speak to me. But that was okay. Now I didn't have to call and check in. Laura and I reveled in our time together. If I'm being honest, it was the most physically gratifying periods I've ever had.

I returned home and begged forgiveness from my wife for having an affair. No, of course I didn't. But I did beg forgiveness for getting drunk. I promised to change. I went to some AA meetings. I stopped drinking altogether.

And then something happened ... as I spent time with my family, I started to fall in love with my wife again. She was trying to work on our marriage. She was less angry, less controlling, more affectionate. We started laughing more. At the end of May, we took an impromptu trip to LA with the boys to watch the Dodgers and the Cardinals (our team) play. It was great. We held hands and enjoyed being a couple.

So when we got home, I wrote Laura and told her it was over. Oh wait, no. That's not what I did. I kept e-mailing her. All day. Everyday. But Laura and I began to slide. Our conversations stopped being fun and started being insecure. Laura was depressed. I tried to pump her up, but her continued sadness aggravated me. I knew she wanted more. I knew she wanted me to leave my wife. I told her I would, some day. Not now. But some day.

My life at home continued to improve while my secret life continued to decline. I took a romantic trip with my wife to the California coast. I lied to Laura about it, telling her that it I was being dragged along by friends against my will. I told Laura that my wife and I weren't having sex. As my secret life continued to fade, I told more and more lies to Laura to keep her around. At this point, I was terrified that she would 'rat' on me if I broke it off.

Laura was supposed to come out two more times. Both trips were canceled. This only made things worse with Laura and I. And then I basically ignored Laura's birthday. This sent her into a horrible funk. She was grumpy and felt worthless and invisible and unloved. My assurances (hah!) to the contrary fell on deaf ears.

And then the inevitable happened: someone tipped my wife off, anonymously. She didn't confront me immediately. Rather she sat on the information all week. Then, on Saturday September 7, she sprang it on me. And demanded that I take her to my office.

I spent the entire car ride hoping beyond hope that she would just look at my computer, take a cursory look around, and find nothing. I reassured her that she wouldn't find anything. But within seconds she was rooting around in drawers, going thru papers. And she found the cufflinks Laura had sent me for my birthday. I lamely tried to lie. But it was out. I was discovered.

I wept, uncontrollably.  I considered suicide. I ranted. I screamed. But I knew what was coming. I packed my things and drove away leaving my devastated wife and two beautiful, innocent boys behind. (To be continued)

Journey Into Hell (part 2)

When I arrived at my friend's house, I set up a new e-mail account under a false name. I sent a frantic e-mail to Laura 'apologizing' for my text. I didn't want to call it off. I loved her too much. Just hang around, I told her, I promise that I'll figure something out.

The next weeks were a whirlwind of emotion. There were fights. There was crying. I spent the night with our friends down the street, but begged my wife to take me back. There was one thought in my head: preserve my image. Preserve the family unit. I'll deal with my emotional issues later.

I started counseling. It was a fig leaf. I lied to my therapist and told him that the relationship with the other woman was over. I'd decided where I wanted to be and that place was home. We also did couple's counseling. I lied there too. 

The next weeks were turbulent. There were threats of divorce (all but one or two from me) and pledges of undying love (on both sides). My wife promised that she'd work on it. She wouldn't leave me. But I had to get it together. On Labor Day, torn, I lost it. I called Laura and told her that I had to stay with my wife. But, I told her, I don't know what will happen. I told her I still loved her. I told her I still wanted her. I told her that I just couldn't leave my boys. Then I got dead drunk and spent the night sending horrible texts to my wife, lashing out at her.

I got a new phone number - and immediately gave it to Laura with instructions never to call me. But we emailed all day every day.

After that episode I settled down a bit. Life slowly returned to some sort of 'normal'. A few weeks later, my wife approached me and told me that Laura was still into me. She found Laura's Pinterest page. There were pins expressing all kinds of lovey-dovey stuff. My initials were all over the pins. My wife made me promise that I wouldn't tell Laura. I promised.

And I held to that promise. Oh wait, no I didn't. I flipped out and e-mailed Laura almost immediately, asking her what she was thinking. She apologized. I asked her not to delete anything, it would make my wife suspicious. She deleted stuff anyway, but told me she didn't. For no real reason, I believed her. This despite the fact that my wife has never lied to me about anything.

My wife asked me about it. How was it that Laura just happened to delete her pins the morning after she talked to me about it? I broke down and confessed what I'd done. Oh wait, no I didn't. I made up some bullshit story about it. We argued about it. I even broke my hand beating it on the floor to emphasize that I wasn't lying to her.

Then Laura came and visited in my town. She got a hotel. I made arrangements to be away from the office. Laura and I had sex during the day, got high, drank, watched movies. Then I went home to my wife at night and acted as if nothing out of the ordinary happened. When Laura left, I cried. I don't know if I was crying for missing her or for the unbearable stress of maintaining this double life.

In a grand gesture, my wife planned a trip for just the two of us. We went across the country to see my favorite football team play. It was an amazing trip. I had a blast with my wife. I also e-mailed Laura a couple of times, telling her that I missed her. I didn't, really. In fact I was more happy in my wife's arms that weekend than I'd been in years. But I had to keep up the affair. Why? I'm not sure. Part of me didn't want to 'hurt' Laura - as I kept lying and lying to my wife. Part of me was afraid that all the lies I'd told would somehow get out.

Life at home started to trend to an uneasy norm. Christmas was awful. My gifts to my wife were thoughtless and weak. But I was offended when I sensed my wife's disappointment. I started to spin out of control. I drank more and more. In January, I hit bottom. I drank way too much and threatened suicide. I got sent to the hospital for observation. When I was released the next day, my wife and kids were on a plane to Colorado.

Journey Into Hell (Part 1)

I had an affair, let's start there.
I'd been married for 8 years, we'd had 2 kids. And then I had an affair.
It started the way these things seem to start these days: on Facebook. She was a person I'd known a bit in high school. She was witty and clever and we 'connected' over things we mutually enjoyed. She had a boyfriend and lived thousands of miles away. I was married. Nothing could possibly come of it, so where was the harm?

Well, the harm was that my wife didn't want me to talk to her. Let me be perfectly clear about something: my wife is not jealous person. She never told me I couldn't talk to this or that girl. She trusted my completely. But this woman - this single person - raised red flags. And she asked me not to engage with her. So what did I do? I ignored her. Why? Because I didn't want to be bossed around. And besides, it was harmless.

My interactions with the other woman - I'll call her 'Laura' - became more frequent and flirty. I began to emulate Laura's lifestyle in my own life. I'd been quite the party guy back in the day, but I'd put that away as I grew up and became responsible for a wife and two young kids. Laura was still part of that lifestyle, and I started drinking more frequently. My interactions with my wife became strained and I became withdrawn and disrespectful.

Laura asked me for my cell phone number and I gave it to her. I did not tell my wife, of course. I rationalized this lie of omission by telling myself that it would just cause her to get angry over nothing. I mean, this girl was a friend, but my wife wouldn't understand that, right? Laura and I began texting occasionally. I thought of Laura often. Everywhere, things would remind me of her. When that would happen, I would text her. We'd share a laugh. She's tell me personal stuff - like that she and her boyfriend split up. But I kept my personal life to myself except for very general stuff about my wife and kids and what we were doing.

One day in the spring, I was out of town for work. I was spending the night in a motel and I was lonely. I had a couple of drinks and decided to text my 'friend'. Our chatting quickly got flirty and then overtly sexual. I told Laura it was inappropriate and to stop. That lasted about .... 10 minutes. The line was crossed. Not gradually or gently, but quickly and totally. The next morning, I regretted this episode and told Laura so. Laura was respectful. She apologized and began to tell me about a guy she liked. *whew* back to just friends.

Did I tell my wife about the encounter? Confess my wrongdoing? No. I didn't mention it at all. My behavior at home got worse. I rarely talked to my wife. I snapped at her constantly. She knew something was wrong, and patiently asked me to let her in. I got defensive and angry and pushed her away. I drank more and was basically a non-person when it came to raising my kids. I justified this in my mind, of course. I wasn't hurting my kids - I just couldn't handle the stress right now.

The lure of what I'd experienced with Laura called seductively and we were quickly back to sex talk. We began texting almost constantly. Our relationship took off. We made plans to see one another: I was going to be out of town for several days. She decided to fly out. I called her - on my wife's birthday. She told me that she thought she loved me. I hemmed and hawed. Told her my family would always come first, but ultimately I told her that I loved her too.

My treatment of my spouse got even worse, if that's possible. I put next to no thought into her birthday, or mother's day. I spent our anniversary having sex with Laura in a hotel room. I began 'bragging' about the new relationship on Facebook and Twitter, sending thinly coded messages to Laura about how I loved her, all the while pretending that I was talking about my wife.

Then as my wife was about to leave for a 10-day visit to see her parents in another state, I dropped a bomb. We were fighting and I said, "this is why our marriage is in trouble." I could see my wife deflate. She knew I'd been off, but she'd never seen any hint of trouble in our marriage. Her hurt stabbed me like a knife. I apologized, profusely. I told her that I had no idea where that came from. I begged her to forgive me. But I didn't confess my affair. And the next morning, she and my kids flew off.

I spent the next 10 days indulging in sexual fantasies over Skype with Laura. I told my wife how nice it was to be alone. I was drunk the second I got home from work. I even skipped a day so I could spend the entire day Skyping with Laura.

3 weeks later my wife and I were arguing again. I blamed her for our problems. She was controlling and bitchy and cold. She was sick all the time. I took not an ounce of responsibility for our troubles. It was the worst fight of our marriage. She cried and called me names. I felt so ashamed that I confessed my affair. Oh wait, no. That's not what I did at all. No, instead of honoring my wife with the truth, I tried to patch it over. I left work early next the day and got some flowers. I'd take her flowers and take her out to lunch. It would be okay.

But it wasn't. When I got home, I found my wife at the computer. Her face was ashen and implacable. She walked out and said she had to run to our friend's house for a minute. She'd be right back. I went to the computer ... she'd been on our phone statement. She'd seen the thousands of texts and phone calls to the other woman. I was found out. But wait - she didn't really know what I'd been doing. I resolved to play it off. "We're just friends, you don't understand, it's not what it looks like..." But my wife had also seen my Skype logs. There's just no way to explain why you'd be on Skype for five hours at a time with a friend.

I broke down and confessed everything. Oh wait, no. That's not what I did at all. I limited the damage. I confessed an inappropriate 'cyber' relationship. There was no proof that we'd been physically together. I made a huge show of texting Laura and telling her it was over. I deleted my social media accounts. And then I went to spend the night at a friend's...

(to be continued)

Withholding Judgment in the Trayvon Martin Case

One of the things that I have learned in my 12 years as a criminal defense attorney is that the media invariably gets it wrong.  If I had a nickel for every time the media coverage of one of my cases was misleading or flat out wrong ... okay, I'd probably only have about $3, but that's still a lot of nickels.  That's why I get frustrated at posts like this one and this one that start talking about "the facts" of any particular criminal case.

Media coverage without question impacts the ability of jurors to deliberate in a fair and impartial manner.  When the media saturates the air and the interwebs with "facts" about a case like this one, it damages the criminal justice system in subtle, yet unmistakable ways.  Often times the public becomes enraged by a not guilty verdict when the news coverage presents the case as open and shut.  The Casey Anthony case is an excellent example, as is the initial case against the officers in the Rodney King beating. 

This type of backlash against legitimate verdicts - arrived at by jurors who listen to the entire case and hear only admissible evidence - leads to a perception that the criminal justice system is broken.  That, in turn, leads to citizens either attempting to avoid jury service or (even worse) actively trying to become jurors so that they can single-handedly "fix" the system.

As difficult as it is - especially in these high-profile cases - the correct approach is to: (1) acknowledge that Trayvon's death is a tragedy; (2) wait and let the criminal justice system do its job.

Pat Robertson on Tim Tebow: It would serve the Broncos right if Manning hurt his neck again.

This doesn't strike me as a very Christian sentiment.  One can debate whether Tebow was treated poorly by the Bronco organization, but Robertson seems to be almost rooting for Manning - also a Christian, by the way - to get injured.

Really?

Rejoice!!  America's problems have been solved!!  Unemployment, debt, gas prices, and all of the other ills facing society are no longer an issue.  How do we know this?  Well because Dick ("Dick") Durbin (D-IL) has called a hearing to investigate the NFL's bounty program, that's how.

Last time I looked, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell had already overreacted ... err ... punished the franchise responsible for the bounty program.  The fact of the matter is that football is a violent sport.  Professional football players are all supremely talented.  They make millions of dollars to exhibit that talent for guys like me (and gals like my wife).  And while going out with the intention of harming someone should never be condoned, Congress has no business sticking its nose into the NFL's. 

Trayvon Martin and the Criminal Justice System

What better to inspire my first blog post than the sad case of Trayvon Martin.  Anyone not familiar with the case can see a helpful timeline here:

This case has led to an explosion of media coverage and punditry focusing on race and Florida's concealed carry and self-defense laws.  Some have called for a change in Florida law.  According to the Huffington Post, for example:

Critics of the 2005 self-defense law said its broad wording led to a perception among Florida residents and law enforcement that the use of deadly force is justified in almost any circumstance in which a person perceives themselves to be in danger. The self-defense doctrine has also been invoked as a defense by hundreds of people involved in fights and shootings, complicating formerly straightforward criminal cases, legal experts said.

Sounds sinister, doesn't it?  Like a recipe for "High Noon" style shootouts on the public streets.  The problem for the critics - read, liberals - is that Florida's law is not particularly unique.  California law, for example, is remarkably similar.  A person in California "need not retreat" from an attacker, "may stand his ground to defend himself" and may even "pursue his assailant" until any danger has passed.  And yet, there have been no outbreaks of vigilante race justice in the Golden State due to the passage of this law.

The fact of the matter is that Trayvon's case should be sorted out by a jury.  Fortunately, both Florida and the Federal government appear to be empaneling grand juries to look into the incident. Given the relative ease for prosecutors wanting to secure an indictment, George Zimmerman will likely be facing charges.  Then a jury of his peers will have the opportunity to sort out whether Zimmerman reasonably believed himself to be in imminent danger of death or was merely a vigilante responsible for gunning down an innocent boy.

Any discussion of this case must necessarily touch on the subject of race.  The usual suspects are out attempting to stir racial tensions up further.  There have been allegations that audio tapes capture Zimmerman muttering racial slurs.  The question is: so what?  Even if Zimmerman was motivated by race - as opposed to a desire to be a tough guy neighborhood cop - what does that have to do with anything?  Trayvon's death is a tragedy whether the motive was racial or not.  There are no "lessons" to be learned here.  No "larger issues" that must be dealt with.  There will always be folks a little too willing to do violence.  And no amount of "dialogue" will change that.