Infidelity Articles By Katie Lersch

One of the most common things that faithful spouses struggle to understand is what their cheating spouse was thinking while being unfaithful. If you polled a large, random group of people, most of those people would tell you that cheating is wrong. Yet, statistics indicate that plenty of married people not only cheat, but then manage to justify their actions and continue their behaviors. This sort of mental gymnastics can be difficult to understand.

Mind Games Are Common: It may help to accept that this type of mental mind game occurs for many different types of vice – not just cheating. For example, it is well established that smoking and excessive sun exposure cause cancer. But, plenty of people still smoke. Plenty of people still use tanning beds. If you were to press a smoker on how he continues to smoke while knowing the risk, he may answer by minimizing his behavior. For example, he may tell you that he knew someone who lived a long life while smoking. Or he may tell you that he only smokes socially. Likewise, the sunbather may tell you that she wears sunscreen during regular sun exposure or that she only tans indoors for special occasions.

Understanding Cognitive Dissonance: This type of justification – where you struggle to hold two conflicting beliefs – is called cognitive dissonance. You know that your behavior is wrong, but you participate anyway. This is only possible when you find a way to minimize or justify your behavior.

And to be fair, we all do this to a certain extent. I know that my exessive coffee drinking may hurt my health, but I haven’t even tried to give it up. I tell myself that the increase in focus negates the health risk. Intellectually, I know this isn’t true. But that doesn’t stop me from my morning crutch.

I realize that an affair is much more serious than coffee, but the mental leaps are similar.

Understanding The Need For Justification: A cheater may think that good, moral people do not lie or cheat. He may also believe that he is a moral person. (Very often, his wife agrees with this assessment. ) And yet, he undeniably lied. There’s no denying that he did cheat. So how does he reconcile the two opposing realities? By telling himself that a moral person who lied and cheated must have a good reason for it. As a result, he’ll search his brain for possible justifications.

He may look at your marriage or at the other person. Ironically, many men do understand that they were victims of cognitive dissonance – but only after enough time has passed for them to have perspective. In the early days of the affair’s discovery, he will desperately cling to his justifications. Unfortunately, there is sometimes a teeny, tiny kernel of truth in his lies.

For example, he may tell you that you didn’t listen enough. He may accuse you of not noticing his restlessness. He may claim that you didn’t have enough time for him.

Now, let’s be real. In every marriage, there are days when you don’t listen to every single thing your spouse says. You can’t always notice every single detail about his behavior. But overall, you try very hard to be attentive, accommodating, and understanding. Still, you can’t claim perfection every single day. Therefore, he may argue that his point is valid.

Calling Him On His Faulty Beliefs: I suggest that you consider challenging any questionable arguments. If he is allowed to believe his justifications, he will not feel the necessary remorse. Frankly, remorse may prevent him from cheating again.

So you may want to try something like, “I know that right now, you may actually believe what you are saying. But I am asking you to take a step back and question these claims. In truth, you are rewriting our marital history. If you look at our marriage honestly, you’ll see that we had our ups and downs like all couples. Neither of us was perfect all of the time. I admit that I made mistakes. Everyone does. But I didn’t grossly neglect you or our marriage. Nor was I inattentive or oblivious to reality. If you were unhappy, you should have come to me and discussed that before just cheating on me. Would you want me to cheat on you at the first sign of dissatisfaction? That’s not what committed partners with integrity do. I’d like for you to re-think your claims when you have a little more distance. I hope you will see that what you’re saying isn’t entirely accurate. And even if it were, there is no justification for lying and cheating. I know you want to be an honorable person, so please re-think this. You’re just making the deception worse.”

Unfortunately, he may not realize that you are right immediately. In fact, he may get defensive initially. He may even bring up instances to prove his claims. If he does, methodically and calmly challenge him and remind him of reality. Again, you may have to wait until he can see the truth. But at least you will know that you did not give him more ammunition.

Please understand that I am not explaining cognitive dissonance to justify cheating. I don’t believe there is any valid justification. But I want you to understand how someone who has otherwise been honorable throughout your marriage can commit this terrible act.

I do consider my husband to be a person of integrity. And yet, he did cheat on me. I would even tell you that he is honorable today. Since much time has gone by since the affair, he can now admit that all of his justifications were an attempt to shift the blame away from his own stupidity. He knows those claims were never true. But in the weeks following the affair, he could not admit this.

Just know in your own heart that he is feeding you lies that are necessary to build a buffer around his own guilt. In time, he will hopefully be able to face his own responsibility. Until then, do not validate his mental gymnastics if you do not believe his claims are true. You know the true state of your marriage before and after the affair. You don’t need to pretend to believe otherwise. But eventually, to heal your marriage, you’ll both have to look at the future instead of the past.  You can read about how we went beyond the past on http://surviving-the-affair.com

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