In talking to spouses about infidelity, one of the topics that routinely comes up is how the affair leaves you doubting yourself. It takes you from a confident, decisive person to one that’s no longer sure about most of their choices.
Robbing you of your confidence makes any decision a wrestling match. When the cheater uses gaslighting on top of that it keeps you doubting yourself even longer.
If you experienced childhood abuse or traumas, the loss of confidence turns into an on-going matter. It was bad enough when you had low self-confidence as a child. With an affair happening in adulthood, it takes you right back to old wounds and pains.
I was reminded of this on reading a post from someone struggling with their choices. She wrote:
“My husband told me he made a mistake by cheating. He also saw her for 6 weeks planned dates and had intimacy. In my mind, a mistake to me is an “accident”. He didn’t ‘accidentally’ end up and the same place as her every week. He didn’t accidentally have sex with her. Am I making too much of this or does this make anyone else’s blood boil?”
Her self-doubt has her questioning whether she’s making too much about what her husband did. She’s second guessing herself about the significance of what happened and what to call her husband’s affair.
He’s got her so twisted up mentally and emotionally, she’s seeking validation from others about what she’s feeling rather than trusting her own reactions.
When you get to the point where you can’t trust your own reactions, and the cheater is deciding what to call their adultery, you’ve lost your confidence. You’re also at risk for other manipulations as well.
I assure you, anything continuing after an initial one night ‘mistake’ is planned and intentional. No matter how much ‘fogging’ the cheater does, what they did was planned.
If anything, you’re downplaying the seriousness of what happened. He needs to be tested for STD’s and the matter of the affair dealt with, including his trying to pass it off as an ‘accident’.
He’s not assuming responsibility for what happened, and he wants you to not hold him responsible either. Part of you is screaming truth, if you listen and start trusting yourself again.
What you would benefit from is the video “Overcoming Affair Relapse”. It guides you in ways of addressing the issues and holding your spouse accountable in a way that reduces the risk if it happening again.
It would also help if he admitted the seriousness of what he did and comes up with a relapse prevention plan that the BOTH of you agree on.
Click and download your copy today.
Keeping It Real,
Jeff
