how do i forgive myself?

[cris4jesus]

me and my husband are both christians. we met in '92 when i was 19 and he was 29 and just newly divorced.(at this time, he was a christian and i was not) our relationship was immediately sexual, although i was not the aggressor, i was young and thought sex as a normal part of dating. (i had only one previous sex partner, a long term boyfriend who i broke up with to be with my (future) husband. my husband who was divorced (his wife left him due to not wanting to be married anymore). our relationship was also long distance as i lived out of state. anyway, after 5 months of dating i became very depressed, thought i made a mistake about breaking up with my first boyfriend (he lived close to me). i tried to get back with him but he moved on. so i became self destructive...crying all the time, couldnt go to class, etc. a friend set me up with this guy whom looking back i just hung around with for company as i was very lonely and confused. but i ended up cheating on my boyfriend (future husband). i immediately became disgusted and never saw him again. i continued my relationhip with my future husband and we dated for 6 more years before marrying. i forgot about this "cheating" incident and never told my future husband. guess i felt i was young, made a mistake.
after being married for several years, i caught my husband in 2 suspicious situations. i dont think he cheated but i think he was considering it. anyway, i was very upset and gave him a hard time (for a long time) as i was devastated! but this "cheating" memory from my past came to mind...and i havent been able to get it off my mind. i feel so bad!
how can i forgive myself? at the time (11 years ago) i did not know this incident would be so upseting to me in the future. i have prayed and asked god for forgiveness of course but it still is on my mind. i feel as if i deceived my husband...he wouldnt have married me if he knew it. how do i forgive myself and forget. its been 11 years ago. i just want to forget about it.
i wasnt trying to be dishonest...just made a mistake that i definately learned from.

 

[MangoTheCat]

Sometimes when I have a hard time forgiving myself, even when I know that God already has, I ask myself who has the authority. You see, if God has forgiven me, who am I to not honor that? Who am I to in effect tell God that he made a mistake in forgiving me? When I refuse to forgive myself for something that God has already forgiven, I feel that I am slapping him in the face.

However... that doesn't mean that I can just go around hurting people and being deceitful knowing that God will forgive me even if they wouldn't. I don't know if you should tell your husband about it or not. It seems to me though that it might be a good way to open a dialogue about his "suspicious situations" though. It may be a good way of showing him that you too have had moments of weakness.. even if it was years and years ago. I think that a lot of people get caught up in the idea that they can't tell their partner when they have doubts and struggles. When that happens, they don't end up getting the support from their partner and it becomes easier to seek it elsewhere.