Infidelity Articles By Katie Lersch

By: Katie Lersch: I will admit that most of the time, I write articles for the faithful spouse. I try to offer tips to help people heal from being cheated on. I do that because that is where my perspective lies. I try to see things from all sides, but since I’ve never been the cheating spouse and I haven’t ever cheated, I typically just stick to what I know.

Sometimes though, the cheating spouse reaches out to me looking for tips that would be applicable to them. It’s probably no surprise that I usually encourage people to end the affair in as quick and as healthy a way as possible. So if you’re here looking for encouragement to keep the affair going, I can save you some time by telling you that you won’t find that here.  I just can’t do that.  I know how damaging affairs can be.

Someone might ask me something like: “I honestly never thought that the affair would grow to mean something to me. It started out as just a fleeting thing. But then I developed real feelings for the other man. And I became very invested in this relationship. I started thinking about having a future with the other man. Both of us agreed that we didn’t want to hurt our families. So we always talked about ‘one day.’ And I was willing to wait. I was perfectly happy with our arrangement. Until one day the other man told me that he was ending the relationship because he knew that he was wrong to cheat. I am devastated by this. Because I had a future to look forward to and then suddenly, it was just snatched away from me. I feel like I need to talk to him about this with closure. He didn’t mention if he was staying with his wife, but if he is, then he’s a hypocrite because he constantly criticized her when we were together. I really want to find out. I’ve texted him, but he doesn’t respond. I’ve thought of going by his house. It is very hard for me to just let this go with no closure.”

Closure is a topic that I get a lot of questions about. Mostly, these questions come from the faithful spouse. I am not sure that there’s any such thing as true closure when you are talking about infidelity.  And I think people make a mistake by not acting because they are waiting for the closure that may never come.  This means that you remain stuck. And true closure implies that you are able to fully close the book on this by getting something that you need. But frankly, you are the only person who can give you what you need. Because you have to be the one to decide to turn your attention to another place.

You have to ask yourself what you’re trying to accomplish. The other man has made a decision. It is his decision to make. It’s not clear if the goal here is to get him to change his mind and continue on with the affair, but he’s already been honest and expressed his doubts about the relationship. Outside of the fact that an affair isn’t by definition a healthy relationship, how can it even approach healthy if he has admitted serious doubts?

The truth is, you are both committed to other people. That is the reality. Again, I am biased. But my honest opinion is that in order to “let go,” you have to begin to break the habits that you’ve developed. You’ve likely become very used to communicating with him and checking in regularly. You may even depend on this to feel OK. I understand that it is hard to abruptly give this up. I understand that you will have to adjust. I truly do.

But you can break this habit like any other. You’re going to have to find new ways to fill the time. You’re going to have to redirect yourself when your feel yourself drifting back to thoughts of the other man. But you can do both of these things – even if they aren’t always easy.  If you need help with this, there is no shame in seeing a professional.  Everyone and all parties can benefit from counseling after an affair.

Going by his house is just going to create additional problems. It is just going to make this process more difficult moving forward. The best way to let go is to do exactly that every single day. That means not calling and not reaching out. That means not looking at old photos or emails. That means turning your attention to what is going to help you move toward a more positive future rather than staying in the past.

Part of what makes this so hard is that you don’t know the future. I know that sounds daunting. But the good news is that this means that the future is wide open for you. Perhaps the universe was looking out for you. Perhaps in its wisdom, it knew that both you and the other man deserved better.

Being a relationship where you aren’t free to be open and honest isn’t ideal. Ask yourself if you (and your spouse) don’t deserve better than this. At least give yourself a little bit of time to just take a break. If you have trouble stopping yourself from trying to reach out to him, tell yourself that you are just not taking action right now and you will reevaluate later. You will likely see that this gets easier as time goes by. Right now, you are shocked. You are hurt. But it gets better in time. And the best thing to do is to move on rather than just prolonging the relationship and therefore prolonging the pain.

Admittedly, I am seeing this from the other side.  But I think that it does get easier in time for all parties involved.

And I know you can’t think about it right now, but saving your marriage is possible, if that is the route you choose.  Many have done it.  You can read more about how I did it on my blog at http://surviving-the-affair.com

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