Infidelity Articles By Katie Lersch

By: Katie Lersch: I sometimes hear from folks who have cheated on their spouses. Many are panicked because they now realize that they have put their marriage in jeopardy. Understandably, they are worried that their spouse may leave them. You may hear comments like, “My wife hasn’t packed her bags and left the house yet. But I suspect she might. I have never seen her so angry. But worse, I can tell that she is deeply disappointed because she never thought that I could do this to her. She looks at me with such sad eyes. I have tried apologizing, attempting to explain myself, and promising her that I will do whatever she wants moving forward. She will offer me no reassurances whatsoever. How can I tell if she is going to leave me? Why do some spouses leave while others stay?”

I will answer this as best as I can. I did stay in my own marriage, although my husband and I lived apart briefly. But I know many wives who left. I will explain what I think the differences are in the two decisions below.

Wives Who Stay See Even A Slight Hope For Healing Or Forgiveness: Many wives tell themselves that infidelity is a deal breaker from the moment they marry. They will often make this very clear to their husbands. However, sometimes, these wives do change their minds. Perhaps they see the sincerity in their husband’s promises at counseling or they want to take their time before deciding to leave their marriage. Some wives do not immediately act on the infidelity because they envision some scenario in the future where improvements could be made, even if they know that this may not happen right away.

Wives Who Leave May Not Have What They View As Incentive To Stay: I have been very honest about the fact that my children were initially my primary motivation for not getting an immediate divorce following the affair. I am not sure that I would have been willing to take that approach if I had not been a mother. But, I had people besides myself to think about. And I knew that growing up with a broken family was not what I’d envisioned for my children. So I decided to at least try to see if our marriage was salvageable. That way, I would always know in my heart that I did everything that I could to save my kids’ family.  If you don’t have kids, then you want to stress that you are still family.

Wives Who Leave Do Not Always Believe In Their Husband’s Sincerity: I know a good deal of wives who pursued a divorce after their husband’s infidelity. In some cases, this was not the first bout of infidelity. Some of these wives were definitely dealing with repeat cheaters. Understandably, each time the trust erodes, it is that much more difficult to get it back. Some wives just don’t want to try anymore when their husband seems not to have learned his lesson. Others don’t want to try even the first time because their husband doesn’t seem all that remorseful or sincere. In short, they don’t want to do all the work to save the marriage only to have him cheat again.

Wives Who Leave Do Not Believe There Is A Viable Plan For Rehabilitation: I know many wives who tried to make their marriages work for quite some time but who are no longer married today. Those wives finally gave up because, despite time and effort, nothing really changed. There was still anger, resentment, and confusion. Even if both spouses really wanted the marriage to work, neither saw much improvement over a fair amount of time.

If I have learned anything from my own situation and from watching others, it’s that you can’t just sit passively and hope for the best. You can’t just tell yourself that things will improve with time if you are not actively working to uncover why the cheating happened and then what you can do to keep it from happening again. You must have a concrete and workable plan for how you are going to restore trust and intimacy because you can not rebuild your marriage without these two things.

It would be wonderful if our marriages would just repair themselves with time and intention. But, in my experience, this is just not how it works.

Some Wives Who Leave Are Not Open To Anything Other Than Leaving: Most of us declare that if our spouse ever cheats, that is a deal breaker. However, there are some of us (like myself) who eventually reconsider for various reasons. Still, there are some people who are extremely firm on what they have already established as deal breakers and they do not deviate from this. The issue of infidelity is very cut and dry for them and they are unwilling to change their minds no matter what their husband does or says. If you are dealing with one of these wives, the best option is loving patience and time. It is very difficult to debate because these wives are firm in their beliefs.

Some Wives Leave But Then Come Back: Some couples temporarily spend time apart after cheating or an affair but come together later after the dust has settled. This was the case with me. I needed time to calm down, gain perspective, and regroup. I honestly think that taking this time was beneficial to me because it would not have gone well if my husband and I had been in constant close quarters immediately after the affair came to light.

If you are a husband who wants to be in this category, do everything in your power to show your sincerity. Do not minimize your wife’s concerns and feelings. Own up to your mistake. Have as much patience, compassion, and understanding as you can muster. Let her set the pace. Commit to counseling or some sort of workable rehabilitation plan and stick to it. It is very hard to heal without one. And that has got to be the goal – to help her, and your marriage, heal.  If you want to read about how we did this in our own marriage, you can visit my blog: http://surviving-the-affair.com

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