Therapy for Infidelity

[Anonymous]

As someone who has reconciled after infidelity (I was the cheater), your therapist sounds terrible. You have every right to voice your pain and hurt without it being minimized. My H and I both pursued individual therapy to deal with our stuff. Then we did "couples therapy" ourselves. We would schedule a time to spend an hour talking through the affair and other hard stuff. We had a few rules: treat each other respectfully, listen, and it was over after one hour. Afterward, we would do separate activities (like go to a movie or to the store) so we could process and decompress on our own. At first these times were a couple of times a week; then weekly; then bi-weekly, monthly, and now, ten years later, we schedule times when needed (and are never dismissive if the other person wants to talk).

Yes, there is some value is finding some joy doing activities together. But there is also a lot of value in talking through what happened. You deserve as much detail as you want. He needs to start taking concrete steps in order to make you feel safe. I post a lot on infidelity message boards, and believe if a WS does not fully take responsibility and deal with their actions, it is likely to happen again. Personally I will never make such a horrible choice again, not just because of the pain I caused my husband, but also because I never again want to be the kind of person who thinks those choices are okay. I did a lot of hard work on myself to get to the bottom of why I did what I did; I shared it all with my H. Transparency is not just about passwords. It was not an easy or quick path and unfortunately many WS want to take the easy way out and that does not ultimately address the root cause.

Like I said, I would definitely pursue individual therapy for yourself and your husband. Stop with this couples therapist and maybe take a few months to see if you can talk through things yourself. If not, and you still want to pursue reconciliation, look for another therapist. I am sorry you are dealing with this. Good luck.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Geeez, get out of the marriage already! Like yesterday. Adultry = divorce. Always.

This. Save yourself the trouble

I would consider this, but it will take time for me to figure out my life alone anyway and be ready to split and we have a special needs child, so spending the next three years together till the child leaves the nest is probably the easiest way forward whether I ever find out the reason or just work on positivity each week and hope he doesn't do it again. He's kind to me other than this issue and is a good father. Might split anyway either by him choosing to or him committing infidelity again, but for the child and my own sanity of just figuring out my life, I'm not really in a hurry to split. I believe the issue is more mental on his part.

I'm trying to get help for myself so I don't fall into despair and so some positivity is actually helpful to a sane mind for myself. It just seems very surface level as if we can only get by if we are positive for the rest of our time together. Might try to find two therapists to give different perspectives on the situation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As someone who has reconciled after infidelity (I was the cheater), your therapist sounds terrible. You have every right to voice your pain and hurt without it being minimized. My H and I both pursued individual therapy to deal with our stuff. Then we did "couples therapy" ourselves. We would schedule a time to spend an hour talking through the affair and other hard stuff. We had a few rules: treat each other respectfully, listen, and it was over after one hour. Afterward, we would do separate activities (like go to a movie or to the store) so we could process and decompress on our own. At first these times were a couple of times a week; then weekly; then bi-weekly, monthly, and now, ten years later, we schedule times when needed (and are never dismissive if the other person wants to talk).

Yes, there is some value is finding some joy doing activities together. But there is also a lot of value in talking through what happened. You deserve as much detail as you want. He needs to start taking concrete steps in order to make you feel safe. I post a lot on infidelity message boards, and believe if a WS does not fully take responsibility and deal with their actions, it is likely to happen again. Personally I will never make such a horrible choice again, not just because of the pain I caused my husband, but also because I never again want to be the kind of person who thinks those choices are okay. I did a lot of hard work on myself to get to the bottom of why I did what I did; I shared it all with my H. Transparency is not just about passwords. It was not an easy or quick path and unfortunately many WS want to take the easy way out and that does not ultimately address the root cause.

Like I said, I would definitely pursue individual therapy for yourself and your husband. Stop with this couples therapist and maybe take a few months to see if you can talk through things yourself. If not, and you still want to pursue reconciliation, look for another therapist. I am sorry you are dealing with this. Good luck.

We did the try to work it out ourselves and he cheated on me throughout it. We got books. Went on dates to talk. All of it and he still cheated. By cheating this time, it was just online cheating that I know of, but still it was cheating. So now we are with a therapist and hopefully a new one soon. We've never done this before, so I just didn't know. I guess if he cheated, it was unlikely that therapy between just us was going to work and I was naïve to think so.

[Anonymous]

I would suggest finding your own therapist so you can decide what you want to do, and if that decision is to stay, you can advocate for yourself in couples therapy (possibly including a new couples therapist).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As someone who has reconciled after infidelity (I was the cheater), your therapist sounds terrible. You have every right to voice your pain and hurt without it being minimized. My H and I both pursued individual therapy to deal with our stuff. Then we did "couples therapy" ourselves. We would schedule a time to spend an hour talking through the affair and other hard stuff. We had a few rules: treat each other respectfully, listen, and it was over after one hour. Afterward, we would do separate activities (like go to a movie or to the store) so we could process and decompress on our own. At first these times were a couple of times a week; then weekly; then bi-weekly, monthly, and now, ten years later, we schedule times when needed (and are never dismissive if the other person wants to talk).

Yes, there is some value is finding some joy doing activities together. But there is also a lot of value in talking through what happened. You deserve as much detail as you want. He needs to start taking concrete steps in order to make you feel safe. I post a lot on infidelity message boards, and believe if a WS does not fully take responsibility and deal with their actions, it is likely to happen again. Personally I will never make such a horrible choice again, not just because of the pain I caused my husband, but also because I never again want to be the kind of person who thinks those choices are okay. I did a lot of hard work on myself to get to the bottom of why I did what I did; I shared it all with my H. Transparency is not just about passwords. It was not an easy or quick path and unfortunately many WS want to take the easy way out and that does not ultimately address the root cause.

Like I said, I would definitely pursue individual therapy for yourself and your husband. Stop with this couples therapist and maybe take a few months to see if you can talk through things yourself. If not, and you still want to pursue reconciliation, look for another therapist. I am sorry you are dealing with this. Good luck.

Can I ask how long it took you to discover why this happened and share it with your husband? Wondering how patient I need to be with this. I realize it must be a series of issues over a long period of time. He's not a terribly communicative person and has some mental health issues, and probably did this partly because he couldn't communicate his feelings well enough, so I expect it will take longer than a woman would which is why I think it's important a therapist leads him to talk about it in a kind way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As someone who has reconciled after infidelity (I was the cheater), your therapist sounds terrible. You have every right to voice your pain and hurt without it being minimized. My H and I both pursued individual therapy to deal with our stuff. Then we did "couples therapy" ourselves. We would schedule a time to spend an hour talking through the affair and other hard stuff. We had a few rules: treat each other respectfully, listen, and it was over after one hour. Afterward, we would do separate activities (like go to a movie or to the store) so we could process and decompress on our own. At first these times were a couple of times a week; then weekly; then bi-weekly, monthly, and now, ten years later, we schedule times when needed (and are never dismissive if the other person wants to talk).

Yes, there is some value is finding some joy doing activities together. But there is also a lot of value in talking through what happened. You deserve as much detail as you want. He needs to start taking concrete steps in order to make you feel safe. I post a lot on infidelity message boards, and believe if a WS does not fully take responsibility and deal with their actions, it is likely to happen again. Personally I will never make such a horrible choice again, not just because of the pain I caused my husband, but also because I never again want to be the kind of person who thinks those choices are okay. I did a lot of hard work on myself to get to the bottom of why I did what I did; I shared it all with my H. Transparency is not just about passwords. It was not an easy or quick path and unfortunately many WS want to take the easy way out and that does not ultimately address the root cause.

Like I said, I would definitely pursue individual therapy for yourself and your husband. Stop with this couples therapist and maybe take a few months to see if you can talk through things yourself. If not, and you still want to pursue reconciliation, look for another therapist. I am sorry you are dealing with this. Good luck.

We did the try to work it out ourselves and he cheated on me throughout it. We got books. Went on dates to talk. All of it and he still cheated. By cheating this time, it was just online cheating that I know of, but still it was cheating. So now we are with a therapist and hopefully a new one soon. We've never done this before, so I just didn't know. I guess if he cheated, it was unlikely that therapy between just us was going to work and I was naïve to think so.

I am sorry. Like the saying goes, you cannot make someone change unless they want to. If I had still been in contact with my AP while my H and I were working through things, he would've been gone immediately (we did not have kids at that time). I will say, a WS cannot focus on reconciliation and healing if they are still in contact with AP. Hard stop. A WS is still dealing with the limerence and...for lack of a better word..."hits" from an affair that make looking at things clearly impossible.

At this point I would start IC yourself so you can start working through how to move forward and what your life and future could look like. I would also probably meet with an attorney just to start gathering information regarding your rights and what to expect. Stop with the marriage therapy...he must be thrilled he doesn't have to face the consequences of his actions. I am so angry on your behalf.

[Anonymous]

He needs regular IC and so do you. After he has done some real work on himself, then it’s time for marriage therapy with a therapist experienced with infidelity. Your therapist now sounds terrible. Also, your DH needs to be doing the heavy lifting to repair your marriage. Read on survivinginfidelity.com.

[Anonymous]

I guess there is a lingo I don't yet understand. AP? WS? Is limerence being entranced by other's bodies online and the feeling that he can have someone give him love verbally without any responsibility back? I think that is what was happening. He did meet up with someone last April for one day only for sex and then stopped but continued searching people on a chat board and just having online interactions with them as far as I know for the past 6 months a couple of times a month. I think what he had is called porn addiction or something. This is all beyond my current understanding as infidelity never crossed my mind. Conversations all over the world lasting a day each, all different people. He was going through erectile dysfunction and some other issues and with his mental health I guess the pornography type behavior was a type of fix he was getting to make himself happy so he's loving this look at the joy of the moment talk. He's not in a relationship with anyone else. He says he's not doing these online behaviors anymore and I believe him, but basically we are in a relationship that is like a month to month lease. I'm not doing it this month etc. but don't know why I did it. Lets find joy this month and see how it goes but you need to forgive me and move on. That sort of talk.

[Anonymous]

IC?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As someone who has reconciled after infidelity (I was the cheater), your therapist sounds terrible. You have every right to voice your pain and hurt without it being minimized. My H and I both pursued individual therapy to deal with our stuff. Then we did "couples therapy" ourselves. We would schedule a time to spend an hour talking through the affair and other hard stuff. We had a few rules: treat each other respectfully, listen, and it was over after one hour. Afterward, we would do separate activities (like go to a movie or to the store) so we could process and decompress on our own. At first these times were a couple of times a week; then weekly; then bi-weekly, monthly, and now, ten years later, we schedule times when needed (and are never dismissive if the other person wants to talk).

Yes, there is some value is finding some joy doing activities together. But there is also a lot of value in talking through what happened. You deserve as much detail as you want. He needs to start taking concrete steps in order to make you feel safe. I post a lot on infidelity message boards, and believe if a WS does not fully take responsibility and deal with their actions, it is likely to happen again. Personally I will never make such a horrible choice again, not just because of the pain I caused my husband, but also because I never again want to be the kind of person who thinks those choices are okay. I did a lot of hard work on myself to get to the bottom of why I did what I did; I shared it all with my H. Transparency is not just about passwords. It was not an easy or quick path and unfortunately many WS want to take the easy way out and that does not ultimately address the root cause.

Like I said, I would definitely pursue individual therapy for yourself and your husband. Stop with this couples therapist and maybe take a few months to see if you can talk through things yourself. If not, and you still want to pursue reconciliation, look for another therapist. I am sorry you are dealing with this. Good luck.

Can I ask how long it took you to discover why this happened and share it with your husband? Wondering how patient I need to be with this. I realize it must be a series of issues over a long period of time. He's not a terribly communicative person and has some mental health issues, and probably did this partly because he couldn't communicate his feelings well enough, so I expect it will take longer than a woman would which is why I think it's important a therapist leads him to talk about it in a kind way.

The first six months after d-day were not ideal for us. I trickle truthed, and saw it as protecting my H, but I was only protecting myself. He's a smart guy and figured it out. At that point, I realized I wanted to change, not for my H but for me. I did not want to be the kind of person who thought these choices were okay. And that is when I went all in on therapy and working on myself. I would share what I learned on a regular basis. 

Reconciliation is a journey, not a destination. I am still working on myself today, ten years after d-day. But it was probably after that six month date that I started really trying to get to the core of my issues. My H called it peeling the onion; every time I got to a point where I said, this is why I did what I did. He would say: that's great, but keep peeling the onion. I peeled the crap out of my own onion. And he was right because it took a while to really understand how I got to where I thought my choices were okay.

All WS and all BS are different. You need to understand how much patience you will have and adjust your expectations accordingly. Are you doing your own IC? It was very helpful for my H, having a safe place to unload everything and talk through steps that would help him. 
I am sorry you are dealing with this.

[Anonymous]

I'm cheating PP. I'm sorry if I used lingo not understood.

AP=affair partner
WS=wayward spouse (one who cheated)
BS=betrayed spouse (one who didn't cheat)
IC=individual counseling
D-day=the day the BS finds out

Also I would second surviving infidelity. My H found that site helpful after our d-day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As someone who has reconciled after infidelity (I was the cheater), your therapist sounds terrible. You have every right to voice your pain and hurt without it being minimized. My H and I both pursued individual therapy to deal with our stuff. Then we did "couples therapy" ourselves. We would schedule a time to spend an hour talking through the affair and other hard stuff. We had a few rules: treat each other respectfully, listen, and it was over after one hour. Afterward, we would do separate activities (like go to a movie or to the store) so we could process and decompress on our own. At first these times were a couple of times a week; then weekly; then bi-weekly, monthly, and now, ten years later, we schedule times when needed (and are never dismissive if the other person wants to talk).

Yes, there is some value is finding some joy doing activities together. But there is also a lot of value in talking through what happened. You deserve as much detail as you want. He needs to start taking concrete steps in order to make you feel safe. I post a lot on infidelity message boards, and believe if a WS does not fully take responsibility and deal with their actions, it is likely to happen again. Personally I will never make such a horrible choice again, not just because of the pain I caused my husband, but also because I never again want to be the kind of person who thinks those choices are okay. I did a lot of hard work on myself to get to the bottom of why I did what I did; I shared it all with my H. Transparency is not just about passwords. It was not an easy or quick path and unfortunately many WS want to take the easy way out and that does not ultimately address the root cause.

Like I said, I would definitely pursue individual therapy for yourself and your husband. Stop with this couples therapist and maybe take a few months to see if you can talk through things yourself. If not, and you still want to pursue reconciliation, look for another therapist. I am sorry you are dealing with this. Good luck.

Can I ask how long it took you to discover why this happened and share it with your husband? Wondering how patient I need to be with this. I realize it must be a series of issues over a long period of time. He's not a terribly communicative person and has some mental health issues, and probably did this partly because he couldn't communicate his feelings well enough, so I expect it will take longer than a woman would which is why I think it's important a therapist leads him to talk about it in a kind way.

The first six months after d-day were not ideal for us. I trickle truthed, and saw it as protecting my H, but I was only protecting myself. He's a smart guy and figured it out. At that point, I realized I wanted to change, not for my H but for me. I did not want to be the kind of person who thought these choices were okay. And that is when I went all in on therapy and working on myself. I would share what I learned on a regular basis. 

Reconciliation is a journey, not a destination. I am still working on myself today, ten years after d-day. But it was probably after that six month date that I started really trying to get to the core of my issues. My H called it peeling the onion; every time I got to a point where I said, this is why I did what I did. He would say: that's great, but keep peeling the onion. I peeled the crap out of my own onion. And he was right because it took a while to really understand how I got to where I thought my choices were okay.

All WS and all BS are different. You need to understand how much patience you will have and adjust your expectations accordingly. Are you doing your own IC? It was very helpful for my H, having a safe place to unload everything and talk through steps that would help him. 
I am sorry you are dealing with this.

Thanks. I think I need you as our therapist! You should go into the business. You'd knock your competition out of the park.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As someone who has reconciled after infidelity (I was the cheater), your therapist sounds terrible. You have every right to voice your pain and hurt without it being minimized. My H and I both pursued individual therapy to deal with our stuff. Then we did "couples therapy" ourselves. We would schedule a time to spend an hour talking through the affair and other hard stuff. We had a few rules: treat each other respectfully, listen, and it was over after one hour. Afterward, we would do separate activities (like go to a movie or to the store) so we could process and decompress on our own. At first these times were a couple of times a week; then weekly; then bi-weekly, monthly, and now, ten years later, we schedule times when needed (and are never dismissive if the other person wants to talk).

Yes, there is some value is finding some joy doing activities together. But there is also a lot of value in talking through what happened. You deserve as much detail as you want. He needs to start taking concrete steps in order to make you feel safe. I post a lot on infidelity message boards, and believe if a WS does not fully take responsibility and deal with their actions, it is likely to happen again. Personally I will never make such a horrible choice again, not just because of the pain I caused my husband, but also because I never again want to be the kind of person who thinks those choices are okay. I did a lot of hard work on myself to get to the bottom of why I did what I did; I shared it all with my H. Transparency is not just about passwords. It was not an easy or quick path and unfortunately many WS want to take the easy way out and that does not ultimately address the root cause.

Like I said, I would definitely pursue individual therapy for yourself and your husband. Stop with this couples therapist and maybe take a few months to see if you can talk through things yourself. If not, and you still want to pursue reconciliation, look for another therapist. I am sorry you are dealing with this. Good luck.

Can I ask how long it took you to discover why this happened and share it with your husband? Wondering how patient I need to be with this. I realize it must be a series of issues over a long period of time. He's not a terribly communicative person and has some mental health issues, and probably did this partly because he couldn't communicate his feelings well enough, so I expect it will take longer than a woman would which is why I think it's important a therapist leads him to talk about it in a kind way.

The first six months after d-day were not ideal for us. I trickle truthed, and saw it as protecting my H, but I was only protecting myself. He's a smart guy and figured it out. At that point, I realized I wanted to change, not for my H but for me. I did not want to be the kind of person who thought these choices were okay. And that is when I went all in on therapy and working on myself. I would share what I learned on a regular basis. 

Reconciliation is a journey, not a destination. I am still working on myself today, ten years after d-day. But it was probably after that six month date that I started really trying to get to the core of my issues. My H called it peeling the onion; every time I got to a point where I said, this is why I did what I did. He would say: that's great, but keep peeling the onion. I peeled the crap out of my own onion. And he was right because it took a while to really understand how I got to where I thought my choices were okay.

All WS and all BS are different. You need to understand how much patience you will have and adjust your expectations accordingly. Are you doing your own IC? It was very helpful for my H, having a safe place to unload everything and talk through steps that would help him. 
I am sorry you are dealing with this.

Thanks. I think I need you as our therapist! You should go into the business. You'd knock your competition out of the park.

Thank you, that means a lot. I wish I could've gotten here without all the pain and destruction I caused to my H. I regret that every day.

[Anonymous]

My ex wife cheated on me. We initially went to a therapist like yours. My ex started telling a remarkably different story of our relationship. I was so upset I started making power point presentations that I was going to bring to dispute the crazy stuff she was saying! Ended up not but it was therapeutic.

God I’m so glad that time is over. While seeing that marriage therapist my ex kept in touch with the AP. I found a burner phone. Then she got another after I found the first. I tried keeping it together for over a year! At one point we had three therapist. Couple and individual. Spent tens of thousands. The ex had no interest in reconciling I’m sure.

I would fire your current therapist. No point in being further victimized. You are a hurt person and this guy is making your husband’s terrible betrayal less serious.

OP I wish you the best.

[Anonymous]

another horrible betrayal will happen the next time any sort of strain arises in the marriage

Op - it's not about circumstance. It's about character.