@seesaw @divine1966 @magicalprince @sarahsweets

Thank you all!

@seesaw, I thank you for your thoughtful reply! Yes I've tried the logical route as well. To logic and reason my way through my emotions. Even that doesn't work well right now for me. It's my emotional state I am dealing with, which is not rational or logical. I never learned how to process and deal with anger and rage very well. And all my anger and rage rose to the surface again when I learned that he stole from me to buy drugs behind my back. He even pretended someone had "dosed" him at a concert I took him to, when it turns out, he had done drugs secretly without telling me, asking me if I wanted him to go to the store for me (that's how he bought the DXM for himself with MY debit card). And no, I should not be surprised to learn this -- and that's exactly what I had written in my journal about it: no surprise there!

@magicalprince, thank you as well for your thoughtful insights and reply! You hit the nail on the head. IF he did truly love me, somehow it makes it less of an insult to my self-esteem and less of a blow to me. IF he didn't, and if it all truly was a lie and he loved her more, then I made the worst mistake of my entire life and it was all a BIG JOKE on me. I was the fool. I was foolish to begin with to get involved with him, but if this is really true? My self esteem and self worth go down the drain... what a colossal mistake that was so very costly to me in SO many ways. If he did love her more, then why did we even get engaged??

And that's what this really is about, I think... is about my self esteem and self worth, and I am battling to feel good about myself. I am battling to place this in its proper place so I can throw it in the river & leave it there for good.

How can I feel good about myself given this situation? He tried to destroy me emotionally, and well, perhaps it actually worked. Maybe that's the real root of all of this....

I want SO badly to put him out of my mind for good. But it haunts me and it's SO hard to stop the feelings and thoughts, even though I am newly married. So, like I said above, logic and reason don't do me any good right now because my emotional state does not match any of my reasoning or logic.

@sarahsweets, yes, perhaps I don't need to actually forgive him. Maybe like seesaw said, it's more about forgiving myself, though I thought I already had a year ago.

At the same time, I guess I just feel like the biggest fool in the world. And I never wish to live with regrets.... I do regret the entire experience, and that's also what I am living with. I say in my happiness blog to eliminate regret from one's life in order to truly be happy. I am a hypocrite then, because I cannot seem to do it myself on this one issue.

@Divine1966, yes you're right.. though I've been through those thoughts before.... I know the mistakes I made... though I probably repeated the same mistake again with my current husband by getting involved too quickly. Then again, things are really good now between us, and things have been great lately. Knock on wood!!!!

I wish I had the answers, but what I do know is that my self-esteem has suffered a huge blow... and that's at the root of this.