When it comes time for making changes in your marriage relationship after an affair happens, you have many questions. The situation you’re in has the both of you in uncharted waters.
One of the questions that regularly comes up concerning that time is “who needs to step up their game and initiate affair recovery?” Although couples talk about equality and sharing responsibilities, these questions are where the rubber hits the road.
Under ideal circumstances, the cheater should initiate affair recovery and start stepping up their game. They created the mess and they need responsibility in cleaning up the mess they created. This means they take initiative in bringing up the affair, they reach out to you.
When you as the betrayed take initiative, it’s a tough situation. Although it’s not impossible for recovery to start with you, it puts you in an awkward position. There’s a built in risk of the situation turning into you chasing after them screaming some version of “Pick me, Pick me.”
Chasing after the cheater is frustrating and soul-sucking. The more you chase, the more confidence you lose. At those times you go from being self-confident to being needy and pathetic.
How you handle the time during affair recovery shapes the future direction and structure of your marriage.
In terms of stepping up their game, the cheater should be initiating actions needed in bringing healing to your marriage. This includes things like removing the AP from social media contacts, getting rid of gifts from the AP (no matter what the value), and going out in public with you.
There are many other ways they can step up their game, this is just a couple of items to get the point across to you.
When the cheater limits the times and frequency you can talk about the affair, they’re being controlling or avoiding. Incidents like affairs entail rehashing the events many times before the matter is settled.
The rehashing isn’t about you not hearing or understanding. It’s about your mind and heart getting resolution and healing a little at a time. It takes several rehashings before things start sinking in.
Although you or the cheater want a timeline for affair recovery, things don’t work that way in real life. Some hurts take longer to heal. Then, there’s the matter of anniversary reactions and triggers. These can turn into setbacks for any expected timeline of recovery from an affair.
If your spouse doesn’t know where to start or how to step up their game, it’s time for them to learn quickly. In the video “Help for the Cheater: Starting the Road to Recovery”, I go over some of the ways they can start the recovery process.
They may have good intentions, but not have a clue about where to start. This will give them some direction and know how about where to start and what needs to be done.
Rather than stumbling and bumbling through affair recovery, they can instead have some direction and awareness of what’s needed.
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Keeping It Real,
Jeff
