Only Good Guys Feel Guilt

11.04.07

And that, dear John, is a fact.

According to Doctor Cecilia d'Felice, "it is generally good people who feel guilt.Guilt-free wrong doers, who should suffer from remorse, are too lacking in insight to feel accountable for themselves. So when you are feeling guilt, remind yourself that it is because you are basically a good person with a conscience, who doesn't want to hurt anyone else."

These words have been ringing around my head since I read then two days ago.

You often spoke to me about how the new life you had created for yourself made you feel guilty - but we now know that you were constantly reminded of this fact by the continuous barrage of texts and calls you received to that end. You had spent the previous seven years of your life working tirelessly, always at the call of others. Your weekends were spent with your son, Saturday and Sunday, caring for him, ensuring that he became properly socialised, did enough exercise and had enough stimulus to help him grow into the child you so adored and hoped would continue to thrive.

When you decided that you could not continue in your marriage, you stayed in the spare room, at the request of your then wife, who insisted that she would make the necessary changes to bring the relationship back to a better place - finally lose some of the weight, do more as a family, help you more, take more responsibility etc. You indeed, hoped this was true, but you saw that it wasn't and so you left.
Interestingly, her own perception was very different. She never told her family that she asked you to stay - instead fabricating a web of lies about you - adulterous affairs, drinking, drug-taking and much more. I never really understood why she would anyone else to be party to the breakdown of her marriage, but I now see that it was all about apportioning blame and creating guilt.

You recounted to me that throughout your marriage, you had made various attempts to leave, and invariably, you had always been pushed to the same threshold of guilt, you were leaving because she was obese, not as pretty as others,infertile, unable to do as much as others, not clever enough etc etc -it was always couched in terms of transferring the guilt to you, and while this frustrated you, it certainly worked, because in the end, you always stayed.

You told me that you had come to accept your lot and that your original plan was to stay until P was 12 or 13 and then you planned to leave.

Except, things got worse, your mother died and you began to reevaluate your life, feeling that as you guessed you wouldn't make it to old age that you should at least spend what was left of your life happy. And you made it clear that, as you once wrote in an email to me, that "the person who is right for you in your twenties, isn't necessarily right for you in your forties."

And then came the hard part. You couldn't live with the guilt. You mentioned that you were so used to being there for P and doing things that the weekends dragged and you felt almost useless. You wanted to be with him, spend time with him and help A in parenting him. But the door was literally closed and locked in your face. And every time you tried to have access to him she prevented you - first with lies in court and when there was no other option, she simply lied to you,claiming that P was sick and you couldn't see him.

Of the last 8 visits you were due since the court order was granted in December 2006, you saw him only 4 times; the last visit was very strained and P was very unhappy. You told me that you felt very down about that.

I see now that the guilt just piled up, and the fire was stoked every time you spoke to your ex-wife or engaged in another mindless exchange of unnecessary text messages. Always ending in the same result. you wouldn't force her hand as you should have done because you didn't want to hurt her or P. And that was the difference between you: you were incapable of willingly hurting another.

Since your death, we have received written declarations from her that she has a clear conscience. I dispute that, as she doesn't have one!

As I said, only good guys feel guilt sweet man.