What It Takes To Survive Marital Infidelity
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When one partner cheats on another in a marriage, it is an intimate betrayal of their marriage vows. A sacred trust is broken and that results in a lot of anger, hurt, and self doubt. Infidelity is a deep wound that will take a lot of time to heal. Repairing the broken trust in a marriage after an affair takes a lot of work. However, couples that have rebuilt their marriage and recovered from an affair claim that their marriage is now stronger than it was before the affair.
Statistically, it is difficult to know how many couples stay together after infidelity has occurred. A lot depends upon how strong the commitment to one another is. If a couple has been married for a while, have children, and own a house together, they have a big incentive to go through the work of rebuilding their marriage.
The cheating or affair must end.
Whether it was a one-time thing that did not mean anything or a long-term affair where there were feelings involved, the spouse that cheated cannot continue to see those other people or any new people. They need to end those relationships forever. You cannot repair broken trust in you marriage if you are still breaking that trust.
Clear the air.
The spouse who was cheated on deserves the truth. The person who cheated needs to take full responsibility for cheating. You need to allow a period of time where he or she should be able to ask as many questions as they want to about the affair and share how it has made them feel. In turn, if you are the one that cheated, you need to commit to being completely honest with your partner about what happened. Some people need to hear the details. Others may not want to know so much about the details. In order for forgiveness to begin, you and your partner need to clear the air about what happened in the affair and why.
Address the issues.
Spouses cheat for many different reasons, but it almost always leads back to some type of issue in the marriage relationship.
- Lack of communication
- Infrequent sex
- Not spending time together
- Feeling taken for granted
Having problems in the marriage relationship is not an excuse for cheating. However, if a couple can start talking about issues that exist in their marriage outside of the cheating, and start taking steps to address those issues, it can help each spouse feel more comfortable that cheating in the future will be less likely to occur.
Take time to recreate your relationship
Whoever did the cheating in the relationship, needs to understand that healing from their actions will require patience. They will need to work at rebuilding trust in the relationship. Both partners will have to understand that their relationship will not ever go back to the way it was, but a new and happy relationship can be built if they are willing to work at it. The couple will need to eliminate the things in their relationship that were not working and replace them with new, healthier habits.
Couples that realize that they still love each other and are willing to work at it, can recreate a relationship built on honesty and trust can grow stronger, gain a better insight into each other, and define what they want from their marriage.
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