Infidelity Articles By Katie Lersch

By: Katie Lersch: Women whose husbands are having an affair sometimes reach out to me. Some of these women are considering confronting or meeting with “the other woman” and are trying to get a handle on this woman’s thought process. Many wonder if she thinks she is in love with the husband or truly believes that she has a future with him.

I might hear from a wife who says: “I am sure that I will be more furious with my husband when my mind has time to process this, but right now, I am in survival mode. I want to clean up the mess. I want to protect my family. The other woman is barely a woman, at least in my opinion. She’s quite young and it seems to me that she’s very idealistic about my husband. I have found notes to him from her and she literally dots her i’s with hearts. She talks about how she can not wait to be with him. The thing is, this woman knows my family. Her younger brother used to be friends with my son. She has been at our home. She knows that we have younger children. She knows that my husband prioritizes his family. But I guess she forgot all that or she thinks that the rules do not apply to her. When I confronted my husband about the affair, he told me that he would end it immediately but he was reluctant to talk to the woman face to face because he knew that she was going to be upset. So I told him that I would break it off. I am going to have my husband ask her to meet him and then I am going to show up in his place. I’m going to tell her it’s over. But I’m wondering what type of reaction I’m going to get. Does the other woman often think that she’s going to get the husband away from his wife? Because if that’s what she thinks, I want to make it perfectly clear that this is never going to happen.”

I can’t tell you that every “other woman” feels one way or another. It’s true that sometimes, she most definitely wants to be with the other man forever. If this means that she has to take him away from his wife and children, so be it. But, she thinks that she is in love with him and she’s not going to let a little thing like marriage stand in her way. Her ultimate goal is to get him to be married to her eventually. And by default, this means that she must take him away from his wife.  This doesn’t apply to “every one” though.  This is a generality which isn’t always true. Some of these women just want a relationship with no strings attached. Some are married themselves and they don’t want another serious relationship.

Here’s the thing, though. Regardless of which category this woman falls into, she can’t be with him or “take him away” from you, his wife, if your husband ends the relationship. In other words, she can’t take him away without his permission. And if he’s ending it, your biggest concern should be your healing as a couple moving forward. Once the affair ends, the attention should turn away from her, at least in my experience and opinion. Her wishes or intentions no longer matter.

Speaking of ending the affair, I never advocate the wife confronting the other woman and I certainly don’t advocate the wife being the one to end the affair. First of all, the other woman will have her doubts that the husband is sincere or if this is his wishes if he is not the one to tell her. The husband could simply call her and make it very brief if he had concerns about her reaction.

But the wife confronting the other woman is almost always a disaster and it often creates bigger problems than it solves. Many wives think that it is going to give them closure or it is going to allow them to put the other woman in her place. Often, the opposite happens. The other woman is rarely nice about this and she will often try to upset you by telling you imitate details about your husband or upsetting details about the affair. Really, very little good can come out of this. And it’s usually only going to delay your healing and upset you even more.  I’d strongly urge you to reconsider.  I have never seen a scenario like this one go well or give you what you want.

You don’t want for her to have any more contact with your family or any of its members, including yourself. So at least in my opinion, your best bet would be for your husband to end it with a very short conversation, possibly by phone, where your husband directly tells her that he is ending the affair because he is married. Whether her ultimate goal was to take him away doesn’t matter because he’s made that impossible. He has made his choice.

I understand wanting to understand the other woman’s thought process and motivations.  But honestly, if your husband ends the affair and the two of you move forward in healing your marriage, then her motivations won’t affect or concern you.  It’s best to place the focus on yourself at that point.  You’re welcome to read more about my own healing on my blog at http://surviving-the-affair.com

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