When I first jumped into the area of helping couples recover from affairs, my initial taste of internet sources was shocking. I researched what was available and didn’t like what I saw. What little I found I classified as “All men are pigs sites”.
In those early days, cheaters were classified as pigs and the affair recovery support groups were man-hating forums. In those forums, cheaters were attacked and maligned. Hurt feelings were expressed, which gave a temporary relief, but not much healing happened. The spurned spouses shared their hurt and hatred. I know they are hurting yet taking it out on others does not provide lasting solutions.
Fortunately, that has changed. As the understanding of affairs is improving, the ways of dealing with them are improving as well.
Affairs are bad for marriages. Affairs are always a bad choice. That’s very clear.
What’s also bad are the ‘responses to the affair’. How you respond to the affair is a major concern as well. Your response often determines whether the affair is or isn’t a marriage breaker. A saying in the affair recovery community is “Often it isn’t the affair that ends the marriage, it is how the betrayed spouse handles the fallout that ends the marriage.”
I like the way Frankie Perez puts it, “How you respond to the issue…is the issue”. Frankie has spent years researching the brain and the effects of stress on the brain. Although he talks about brain function, his insights have application to affairs. Your response to the situation is critical.
My affair variation is “How you respond to the affair…is the issue“.
With the issue of the affair, your response is important. If you treat the cheater like a pig and have a pig-hater attitude, you’re limiting the likelihood of affair recovery.
At times I’ve wondered how many marriages have been ruined by the “All men are pigs” forums and their ilk. Such sites give you energy in tackling the affair, yet it’s a negative energy. It also doesn’t help when you tell yourself that there is “no way in hell you’ll ever forgive him.”
That negative energy relishes destruction and pain rather than healing and restoration.
The point worth stressing is that your response to the affair matters. How you react and deal with the cheater shapes the direction your marriage.
In dealing with the affair, you need resilience. Resilience includes bouncing back from the shock, shifting perspective and being flexible in your responses.
In the video ‘Overcoming Affair Trauma’, I guide you in ways of improving your resilience. You may not be resilient now, yet you can learn ways of improving. The video shows you ways of doing that.
Keeping It Real,
Jeff
