How to cope with a cheating spouse

Within the recovery community, there is a saying that ‘normal’ is a setting on the washing machine. There is some wisdom in how that group approaches the topic of ‘normal’. In recovering from an affair, although you may want to go back to ‘normal’, in most cases, normality is not your friend. Even wanting to ‘go back to the way things were’ is a misnomer. The Pandora’s Box of an affair has changed everything. You cannot go back. ( I have a chapter dealing with this in my book, How to Recover From Your Partner’s Affair). The reality is ‘the way things were’ is part of what led to the problem. If you want to be healthy, focus on ‘getting real’, “getting genuine”, or “getting honest”. Each of those is healthier than ‘the way things were’. Sure you can once again enjoy your marriage, and even do so at a deeper level, with some similar experiences as you shared in the past, but you are not going back. There has been a loss of innocence. The only way to literally go back is to put your blinders back on, and live with a systematized denial.

When many people talk about going back, they are wanting to re-create emotions and dreams from the past. You cannot keep replaying the dreams over and over. In real life, you will find that there is a dream, followed by the death of a dream, and then a re-commitment to the goal, whereby the dream finally materializes. Although this formula is not pleasant or fun, it is the reality of what has occurred in many peoples lives. Just look at the lives of notable persons and you will see such a pattern. Look at Moses, Abraham, David, Martin Luther, Beethoven and others. You will see a similar pattern.

I share this to keep you from asking “When will I feel normal?”. Such a question sets up unrealistic expectations. Some better questions are “When will I thrive?”, “When will my routines settle down?”, “When will this crisis end?” . Such questions will help you develop a realistic view of the situation, what you can do and what to expect.

Best Regards,

Jeff Murrah

In the aftermath of an affair, taking care of yourself is important. Simple things like getting the correct amount of sleep, eating right and exercising become chores. Although these activities require effort, they are important in mastering your day to day survival. At first, you may feel robotic and have to force yourself in doing such things. At first it is ‘going through the motions’. It is not going to feel routine until you have moved passed the pain. Although the pain seems like a bottomless pit, it does not last forever. The emotions are deceiving. They will tell you that the pain is going to go on forever. Pain does not go on forever. It will eventually fade and reduce.

Some of the things not to do include using drugs/alcohol or having an affair yourself. These are times to take care of yourself, not loose yourself. If you do not take care of yourself, who will? You need to get your body, soul and mind clear before you can move on with the healing.

I have been doing some studying concerning some new insights on affairs which I hope to present to you in August. The new material focuses on the mindset people are in while involved in an affair.

Best Regards,

Jeff Murrah

Every mechanic will tell you that preventive maintenance is always preferred to repairs. The same is true regarding counselors and marriages. Preventative changes are always preferred to having to be forced into changes through repair. Although common sense and experience validate these behaviors, humans, especially in marriage do not operate that way. With people, there is greater willingness to seek help for their marriage when in in crisis than when it would have been preventative. The problem with crisis changes, is that they are more dramatic, more painful and often have to be quickly.

When crisis changes occur, they radically alter the whole relationship. They take us out of our comfort zone. They feel weird and awkward. There is no gradual adjustment.

After the changes are made, then maintenance is required to keep those changes in place. You and your spouse will need to keep working at the communication and intimacy. It becomes and on-going process. It will be worth it in the long run although the initial change is painful.

Best Regards,

Jeff Murrah

Affairs are expensive. They are costly in both time and money. I have been amazed at how those having affairs are caught up in a blind drive of both self-seeking passion and self-destruction. When in the midst of the affair, they are blind to the cost of what is happening. They are blind to the effect of their action in both time and money. It is as if they are in a fugue sate, or in another world. While in that state, spending money or time on their lover is not a problem for them at all. It seems that they look forward to solving problems of how to see their lover. They lavish them with gifts, thinking little of the price or the consequences.

When they come out of it, they report being “out of it”. I have heard them tell of being in almost a hypnotic trance while in the midst of the affair. While your spouse in in such a state, they are not capable of being rational. Before you approach them with logic, they need to wake up. Once they are awake and capable of logic, then you can attempt reasoning with them.  The length of time they are in this trance varies with each affair situation. Some spouses do not wake up until after the divorce, but then it is too late. The lover also tried to trap them and hold them with emotional and psychological chains on their body, heart, mind and time. Once they wake up, it is often even more expensive to try to escape the situation they are now in. It concerns me that so many sites that address affairs, actually encourage people to seek divorces in the aftermath of an affair, while people are not thinking straight. Here also, by the time, the couple wakes up to what has occurred, the damage has already been done.

Before you consider divorce, whether you are the resolute or adulterous spouse, wake up and count the cost, BEFORE you sign on the dotted line. What seems to be a quick fix, often has a large price tag.

Best Regards,

Jeff Murrah