Infidelity Articles By Katie Lersch

By: Katie Lersch: Many faithful spouses start out feeling that something is off with their spouse. He’s acting weird. They notice that he is doing things that he wouldn’t normally do and saying things that he wouldn’t normally say. So for a while, many faithful spouses watch and wait.  

Eventually, they may see some text messages, DMs, and social media interactions that would look inappropriate to any logical person. Then that feeling that something is off turns into a certainty that the faithful spouse’s suspicions were correct.  

She may watch and wait for a while longer before she confronts him. But when she does, she doesn’t get the reaction she was hoping for. He pretends he has no idea what she’s talking about. He’ll tell her that she has a good imagination or that she is paranoid or even crazy. And then he’ll straight up deny that he was cheating.  

So she goes back to the drawing board and attempts to get more proof. When she does, she approaches him again, but no matter how she comes at it, he makes it clear that he is never going to admit to anything. He’s never going to give up his repeated defenses.

She might say, “I know that my husband cheated. I pretty much got the other woman to admit as much. But he will not give an inch when I confront him about it. He’ll ask me if I caught him in the act. He’ll ask me if I literally saw him cheat. He’ll ask me if I have video or photographic evidence. He knows I have none of these, so he acts like that’s the last word. He acts like if I can’t prove anything, then it didn’t happen. So I feel like I’m somewhat stuck. How do I know for sure that he’s cheating if no one will actually admit to it?”

The Cheating Spouse Will Often Find Ways to Try to Fool You: This is very tricky, and this question comes up quite a bit. I’ve actually known people who’ve attempted to hire investigators to catch the cheating spouse, but then he stopped cheating because he knew the wife was onto him, so she couldn’t even catch him that way. Many times, if a cheating spouse thinks you’re very close to catching him, then he’ll just shut the entire thing down. 

Many Cheating Spouses Can Walk Away From the Affair Without a Backward Glance to Avoid Detection: Even though many people perceive that affairs involve real feelings and legitimate, growing relationships, statistics often show the opposite. Often, these are short-term relationships that fizzle out upon detection, once the novelty wears off, or shortly thereafter. There are exceptions, of course, but many cheating spouses can walk away from the relationship rather than getting caught red-handed and having to admit to wrongdoing. Because honestly, the relationship just didn’t mean that much. 

Deciding if You Want to Go Forward Anyway: If you’ve tried everything and he’s continued to deny it, you really have to decide if you want to proceed as if he cheated without needing that proof. Many wives decide that their gut feeling is enough and that having “enough” circumstantial evidence is good enough for them. 

So these wives proceed as if he’d cheated. They just stop asking him about it, and they carry on as if a confirmation has already happened. And that can shift the power. You go from begging him to give you a confirmation to acting as if you don’t need to get one from him anyway.

Of course, this won’t work for every spouse. Some will want to give their spouse the benefit of the doubt or talk themselves out of the worst-case scenario. They’ll tell themselves that perhaps they’re seeing things that don’t exist or that there is a logical explanation for everything. But still, there is a nagging doubt in the back of their mind. And they cannot rest.

If You Truly Need Confirmation: Sometimes, in cases where you truly need confirmation, if you can get your spouse to go to some type of counseling – even at your church – the counselor or pastor will need to get some background and will gently nudge your spouse to admit the affair.

Other times, you can try to work your way through self-help, and when you ask him to participate, it will, like with counseling, ask both of you to identify some of the things that went wrong. Again, it’s a nudge for him to come clean at a time when you’ve shown good faith that you are trying to work with him.

Finally, sometimes, the wives who proceed “as if” finally get a confession when it becomes obvious that she’s going to assume he did it anyway. Whether he cops to it or not, she’s going to require rehabilitation and healing if he wants the marriage to resume in the same way it used to. 

She’s going to hold back from him until he gives her what she’s been looking for. So what’s the point of lying?

Understanding His Backward Mindset May Help: I know that this is frustrating. It’s exhausting when a spouse refuses to admit to the cheating you both know is present. It would be so much easier if he would have the integrity to own up to his behavior. I have been through this. It is infuriating when your spouse plays games on top of cheating.

But it may help to try to understand his mindset. He believes that if he can stall or even deny it, then he can avoid the consequences and the pain. He knows that once the cat is out of the bag, you are going to be very hurt – especially when he has to tell you everything, and you learn even more of the details. Many cheating spouses would want to avoid this at all costs. In his mind, he’s trying to spare some of the fallout, which he may believe is understandable or even justified.

I’m not saying that you have to believe anything he says. I’m just suggesting that if you understand his thought process, you’ll have an easier time getting around it. You get to decide if you’re going to accept his denials or not. You get to examine all of the evidence and decide if it is more than enough for you – no matter what he says to the contrary.

I was lucky that I had indisputable proof.  However, there were many times where it felt like I had to pull teeth to get information.  And I had to figure out the best way to deal with a spouse who sometimes wanted to rush the healing process.  You can read about how I eventually successfully navigated this at https://surviving-the-affair.com

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