After the affair, you may find yourself dealing with ‘ghosts’ from the affair. Even though the affair is over, these ghosts leave you feeling like it’s still in high gear.
Dealing with affair ghosts <<– listen to the audio here
Hi, this is Jeff Murrah with Affair Recovery Radio. Today we’re going to be talking about dealing with affair ghosts.
I mention this as a topic because after the affair, even after things have ended and your spouse is back home, you may find yourself having to deal with what I call “ghosts of the affair”.
The ghost in this case is not a literal ghost, but these are those items, places, songs, etc., that trigger recollections of the affair. There are times you may be out in public and a song comes on, or something occurs, that triggers recollections of either the pain you went through, or even in terms of the cheater it might trigger memories for them. This is a very real problem for a lot of people, and that’s why I want to go ahead and spend some time talking about it.
Although the affair is over, it can leave you feeling like something is still going on. In many ways it is, because even after you get rid of the physical affair it’s going to take longer to remove all the emotional and spiritual aspects of the affair.
That takes a little longer because that’s where the affair got into their heart, it got into their head. It’s going to take awhile to remove that.
And it also got into your heart, and your head, and you’re going to have to remove that.
This is why it’s dangerous to just assume that because the physical affair’s over everything is fine and dandy, because it’s not ‘fine and dandy’. You’re going to have to take this thing out and take it out by the roots. If you cut something down just to where you can’t see it, the roots are still there doing their thing. You don’t want that.
In terms of a solution, some ways of dealing with affair ghosts.
1. Redecorate your home. It doesn’t necessarily have to be new furniture, just move things around. That can help.
Change the picture, change where the furniture is, change how you use rooms. Maybe change the color of rooms.
The reason for this, many times those old rooms and familiar surroundings can trigger old memories. Because it’s almost as if once you are in those surroundings those old sensations come back. Because in your mind, your mind feels like hey, I’m back in this situation again. Things look familiar again. It can trigger all that stuff all over again.
Rather than have to feel like you keep fighting the same battle over and over again, do something. And in this case what you’re going to need to do is just change. Because when you change how a room is decorated, what the color of it is, how it’s set up, that’s going to change the feel of it.
That’s part of what you’re after here, because getting rid of the ghost, you may have gotten rid of all the mementos, which I hope you have, but you’re going to need to redecorate.
Because old surroundings often trigger old feelings.
2. Create new memories with your spouse. What this means, when you go out with your spouse you’ve got a new relationship. You’re going to need to do some new things. Try new foods, go to new places, try listening to new music.
If you get back into the way things were before, there’s a time and a place for nostalgia, but you don’t want to get stuck in the mud and have to dredge up some of the old, unpleasant feelings that were there before.
You’re going to have to be open to the option of change. Not everything has to be new. You don’t have to totally dispose of all the stuff. But I encourage you, put enough newness in your relationship for things to be different.
You want to put the welcome mat out for your spouse, to get them back in the home, and you want to start a new life together, you’re going to have to treat it as new and not just something that’s being recycled. I know being green and recycling is popular nowadays, but when it comes to recovery from after the affair new is better than the recycled.
3.Eliminate the source of ghosts. This means when in your day to day routine if you come across something that triggers those old feelings eliminate it. It may be a photograph or maybe it’s some object that was in the house, if it in any way has an association with the affair, either with the cheater and what they were doing or reminding you of your suffering that you went through during that time, you want to identify the source of what the trigger is and remove it.
In some cases you may be able to re-purpose it or change it, but the preferred option is to go ahead and remove it. Because these things do have an influence and have power.
I hate to say that they have their own vibes, because that makes me sound a little too woo-woo, but let’s just go ahead and say that all the pictures and surroundings that we have in our environment, they exert an influence on us. It’s almost like we shape them and then they start shaping us.
If those things that are influencing us are associated with the affair, it only makes sense that there’s going to be the sensation of ghosts. Where you feel like everything is not settled, where you feel like things are still open-ended. That you’re still back in the trenches, so to speak.
I want to get you to move past that. Because I know once the physical affair is over you’ve got to deal with these other aspects of the affair, with the emotional and spiritual aspect. Those are going to have to be dealt with and removed. Because if they’re not it’s only going to be a matter of time before you find yourself in the same situation again.
These are some things that you can do to go ahead and start making some changes in terms of removing the affair ghosts. I encourage you to go ahead and put these into place as soon as you can, because the sooner you do it the better. Delaying it is only going to create more suffering, more pain, more anguish for yourself.
Another way of taking action in removing ghosts is having a good relapse prevention plan. In the “Overcoming Affair Relapse” video, I address the issues involved in relapse prevention.
Best Regards,
Jeff
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