Infidelity Articles By Katie Lersch

By: Katie Lersch: I sometimes hear from people who feel a little guilty that they haven’t made more progress after their spouse’s affair. This can especially be true if the cheating spouse is very obviously doing everything in his or her power to make things right once again.

Common comments are things like: “I truly have to give my husband credit. He has done every single thing that I have asked of him after his affair. And he has even done some very thoughtful things that I didn’t ask him to do. It’s obvious that he is trying very hard to make this work. He comes straight home from work. He doesn’t socialize anymore. He allows me to examine his phone and computer without any complaint whatsoever. He goes to counseling and he participates as best as he can and he never complains. In short, he has been as accommodating as he possibly can. There isn’t anything that I can criticize except for the fact that he had the affair in the first place. Sometimes, after we go to counseling, he will take me out to dinner and look at me with eyes that say he is hopeful and that his expectations are high. I know that he is hoping and expecting that things were going to start to improve. And I can’t blame him for this. It’s just common sense to think that if you do what is asked of you, then you are going to eventually be rewarded for it. The problem is that I am still so very angry at my husband. I still don’t know if we are ultimately going to be able to save our marriage. And I don’t want to tell him any of these things because I don’t want to dash his hopes, especially when I don’t know what is going to happen. How can I hold back my anger when he is trying so hard?” I will try to address these concerns below.

Know That You Anger Is Normal Regardless Of What He Is Doing Or How He Is Acting: It can make you feel cruel and abrasive when you feel genuine anger when he is trying so hard to diffuse this anger. But frankly, your anger is absolutely normal and understandable. And you wouldn’t feel the anger if he hasn’t had an affair and put this whole process into motion. So, as difficult as things may be for your husband right now, his actions caused this and he must expect that this is going to be a difficult process for both of you.  So you don’t need to feel as if you have to apologize for your anger and or it. It is possible to acknowledge his efforts while still respecting your own true feelings, which leads me to my next point.

There Can Be A Mix Of Healing And Anger, Especially At First: I find that people tend to think that if they are feeling negative emotions, then they aren’t truly making any progress. This is not the case. Frankly, when you are recovering from your spouse’s infidelity, it is completely normal for your emotions to be all over the place. You can feel loving and forgiving feelings for your spouse in the morning and then feel fury in the evening, despite the fact that your spouse has not done anything wrong. It is totally normal to have these types of fluctuating and swinging emotions even when you really are making progress. As time passes, these sorts of swings begin to happen less and less. But they can happen with out their presence meaning that your marriage won’t make it or that you will always be angry.

Making Your Spouse Understand That Your Anger Doesn’t Mean That They Aren’t Doing The Right Things: With all of the above said, it’s important that you make your spouse understand that you acknowledge his efforts. You wouldn’t want for him to misinterpret your anger and to think that he was going something wrong. It’s probably a safe bet that at some point, he is going to question your anger. At that point, you might take the opportunity to say something like: “I know that you might be discouraged that I still have some anger. I want for you to know that I truly am trying. But I think that this is all going to take some time. I want for you to be patient and to keep doing what you are going. Believe me, I notice and appreciate all that you have done. It’s obvious that you are really trying. I don’t want for you to assume that it doesn’t matter to me because it does. I’ve read that it’s normal for me to still feel some anger from time to time and this should get better as we continue to make more and more progress. And I will be careful to not punish you with my anger, but I can’t hide it either. It’s an honest emotion and I believe that we both need to be honest with one another. I don’t want to hide anything from you and I don’t want for you to hide anything from me. I believe that we are making progress. And I believe that things will get better and better with time. I am just asking for you to have patience because I can’t fully control the way that I feel. But I am trying. And I know that you are too.”

There’s no guarantee that these words will heal his hurt feelings or make your anger disappear. But it can’t reassure him that this is normal. And it can lay the foundation for openness and honesty in the future which is incredibly important. Because neither of you want to be in the position where you are hiding your true feelings from your spouse.

Frankly, it took a long time for my own anger to completely disappear after my husband’s affair.  We both used to find this discouraging, but thankfully we pushed forward anyway and the anger is something that I don’t have to deal with anymore.  I would encourage you to keep going despite the fluctuating feelings.  Because as you make more and more progress, you will usually find that this problem diminishes with time. You can read more about our recovery on my blog at http://surviving-the-affair.com

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