CAN YOU EVER REALLY FORGIVE AND FORGET? GOOD TASTE TALKS TO THREE READERS WHO HAVE HAD THEIR TRUST SHATTERED TO FIND OUT HOW THEY ARE LEARNING TO MOVE ON
“I have forgiven my father’s killer”
Andrew Watson* was only 13 years old when his dad was killed in a car accident. Now 23, he has found the courage to forgive his father’s killer.
When Andrew was 13 his father was hit by a car and killed while riding his bike to work. His death has been the defining moment in Andrew’s life. “When it happened, I felt singled out, isolated and separated from the rest of the world. As a child, to see your mother crying is one of the worst things. You look up to your parents for strength so, if you feel you can’t rely on them, who can you rely on? Our family was in a shambles at that time.
“I had been very close to my father. I remember walking with him to the shop and helping him build shelves. I remember him giving me a feeling of security and comfort. He was my hero.”
Going back to school was an especially difficult time for Andrew. “I felt different. I felt I couldn’t join in with the rest of the kids in my class. I was a child, but I was broken. The others were going back to homes where everything was fine. I was not and I couldn’t deal with it. The fact that life all around me seemed to go on as normal made it worse.”
At first Andrew gave little thought to his father’s killer, but as the months passed and the court case began, things became more emotionally taxing and Andrew struggled to cope with the pain. “As I grew older I realised what I had lost and how much he had put me through. The driver of that car did not only kill my dad, he killed my childhood. I had to grow up before I knew how to. I knew it was an accident, and that the man responsible was young when it happened, but that didn’t make it any easier. He could never understand the full meaning of what he had done to us… to me.”
Andrew had a lot to forgive, so it’s not surprising that the road to forgiveness was a long one. “Forgiveness is a choice. Two years ago I began to realise the burden I was carrying on my shoulders because I could not forgive. There was a weight that wouldn’t go away. I was trapped and I knew that, if I was to get out of this shell, I would have to let go and cut those emotional ties binding me to the past.
“For the first time, I began to think about the man who did it in a new way.
I wondered what he had been through. How difficult it must be for him to know
he killed a man; a husband, a father. The whole process of thinking like this took about a year. I saw a counsellor every day and, eventually, it became easier for me to accept what had happened and what I’d lost. It seemed to be no longer a problem and more of an experience.
“Forgiving has really helped. Since I forgave him, a weight seems to have been lifted off me. I still have pain – it will always be there – it helps keep me in tune with what happened.
“The older I get, the less I think of my father. The memories start to fade. This hurts in the sense that I have only a few precious memories and have gone over and over them so much that I have worn them out. But, although my father was taken away, I haven’t lost him. I know he is waiting for me and we will meet again.”
WHAT THE EXPERTS SAY
Dr Annie Crookes, programme coordinator and lecturer for psychology at Heriot-Watt Dubai Campus sheds light on how to cope with losing a loved one.
“This is one of the most difficult situations – however there is evidence that often families of accident victims do find ways to forgive the offender once they understand that it was an accident and can see the remorse in the person. In this case Andrew was eventually able to put himself in the offender’s shoes and know just how bad it would feel if it had been the other way around. This lets you empathise with them, which builds forgiveness. It is also important, particularly in this situation, for us to try to build a rational understanding for what happened so we can rebuild a feeling of safety and control in our world. So finding out details of what happened – trying to put a story together in your mind – may help to fit it into your representation of the world.”
“My brother stole from us to pay for drugs”
Vicky Marsden* was left to pick up the pieces after her younger brother stole money from the family. Five years later, the siblings are trying to rebuild their fragile relationship.
Scott* was a good boy growing up, but he started mixing with the wrong crowd at college and his personality slowly changed for the worse, tells Vicky. “I am eight years older than my brother, but we had always had a good relationship.
I doted on him. He was a good kid, but we all started to see a negative change in him as he got older.”
During his teenage years the family started to notice a change in Scott’s personality. “He was always moody; his appearance changed; he started smoking and drinking. It wasn’t long before things escalated and he started to experiment with drugs. He eventually lost his job and so it wasn’t long before he started stealing to feed his habits. Scott stole my mother’s jewellery, he took money from her purse, mine too. I didn’t know who this person was. I still cannot fully comprehend what he did.”
Scott’s problems began to cause problems between Vicky and her mother. “My mother was a lot quicker to forgive Scott. He is her baby, her only boy, her youngest child. She would always make excuses for him. It made me so angry. We would often fight about him and what he was doing. I wanted to go to the police and let the authorities deal with him and make him take responsibility for his actions, but my mother didn’t want to.”
Eventually, the family convinced Scott to seek professional help. He is now in a programme and has been sober and drug-free for three years. “I hated my brother because of his drug and alcohol addiction and the way he hurt me and my mum.
I carried this resentment for a couple years until, finally, it clicked. The longer I stayed mad at him the worse my life became. My hurt and anger wasn’t affecting him so it was pointless to hold on to it.
“I learnt about addiction and how, when you’re addicted, the addiction is the only thing that matters – no matter who you hurt – so I forgave him and then I forgave myself for allowing his problem to ruin my life. Our relationship is still patchy, but we are slowly working on rebuilding it. I don’t think I will ever fully forgive him for the pain he put us through, but I understand his reasons now and we are trying to move forward and put the past behind us.”
WHAT THE EXPERTS SAY
Dr Crookes explains how forgiveness can benefit Vicky, even though she was hurt by someone she loved and trusted.
“Getting hurt by someone puts you into a negative state of mind where you focus on bitterness and anger. These emotions can put you into a vicious cycle of reliving where you went wrong and how you could have done things differently to help. Forgiveness is the process of changing this negative cognitive cycle – moving the negative thoughts to positive, pro-social ones. This will benefit your emotions, thoughts and behaviour towards the other person and belief that this was a unique situation and not necessarily something that will happen again.”
“My best friend betrayed me with my husband”
Reem Menon* and Anna* were best friends; that is until Reem found out that Anna had betrayed her in the most painful way – by having an affair with her husband of three years, Ahmed*. Reem is still struggling to forgive them.
Reem had been in a relationship with Ahmed for eight years and thought she had found her soul mate. “Trust had never been an issue in our relationship. We loved each other and had been through so much, I never imagined he would cheat on me, never mind with my best friend.”
Reem’s job involved a lot of travelling and she was often away weeks at time. “Ahmed and I always thought of this as a positive – we always looked forward to seeing one another and sometimes he would come and join me on longer trips.
I thought it strengthened our relationship, but obviously I was wrong. Instead, it gave him the perfect opportunity to cheat and break my heart in the process.”
Following one trip around a year ago, Reem noticed that Anna’s behaviour was unusual; she avoided Reem’s phone calls and didn’t turn up for their weekly dinner date. “Ahmed was slightly ‘off’ too, but, of course, I didn’t put the two together. A few days later I bumped into a friend in the supermarket and she mentioned that she had seen Ahmed and Anna out at a restaurant. I wasn’t angry or surprised – they are two people who I loved and we all often spent time together. But on the way home I began thinking it was strange that neither of them had mentioned it to me.”
When Reem confronted Ahmed, he denied meeting Anna for dinner, but when Reem finally got in touch with Anna, she admitted it was true. Reem arranged to meet Anna for lunch, where she found out it was much more than a dinner date. Anna and Ahmed had been having an affair for 15 months.
“Anna broke down crying, asking for my forgiveness. I couldn’t believe it. She just started pouring out information, about all the times they had met behind my back and how she couldn’t deal with the lies any longer. She wanted to work through this and go back to the way we were before, as did Ahmed, but I was finished with both of them. I know they say ‘forgive and forget’, but I can’t. My life was turned upside-down by the two people I trusted the most. It’s been almost a year since Ahmed and I got divorced. I am working on forgiving them both, but it will take time. One day at a time.”
WHAT THE EXPERTS SAY
Dr Crookes advises counselling for Reem, as this may help deal with the trauma of the affair.
“Counselling can help Reem find ways to express her emotions and explore what she is going through. It can also teach some techniques that may help her change her thoughts from negative to positive. Counselling has a significant impact on forgiveness and wellbeing, compared to what people can do on their own.”
WORDS: CINDY L BAILEY. IMAGES: SHUTTERSTOCK. *NAMES HAVE BEEN CHANGED
