In this post I will address how children are impacted by their parent’s affairs. In subsequent posts I will discuss the effects on adult children of affairs and offer suggestions for parents involved in affairs on how to best support their children through this difficult time. You may also wish to read about “Children of Affairs”. Many couples I see who are trying to work on healing from an affair
Obsessing over a partner’s infidelity is a natural response to the trauma of discovery. Most individuals find themselves unable, at times, to stop turning over in their minds the lies, snippets of conversation, unanswered questions and things that never added up. Re-visualizing the same devastating images of the affair couple together is also very common. Although this can be agonizing it is actually part of the healing process that will probably go on for some time. It might feel strange…
In order to help yourself when you can’t stop thinking about the affair, it is important to understand the different functions obsessing can serve in your healing process. My first and most important piece of advice is to try to stop beating yourself up for those times when you can’t stop going over the details, questions, lies, or things that just don’t add up, over and over again. (For more about lying click here.) It is important to understand that …
“Men weren’t really the enemy – – they were fellow victims suffering from an outmoded masculine mystique that made them feel unnecessarily inadequate when there were no bears to kill” Betty Friedan, Christian Science Monitor, April 1974 “Mad Men” portrays this “mystique” … women as subordinate and submissive, housewives, maybe secretaries, always standing behind their men, and only able to derive status from their husbands’ positions. The women who dared to deviate from this arrangement paid dearly (as did…
It might seem like the questions will never stop, or that there are no answers that can satisfy. However, there is a kind of “healing intelligence” behind these questions, and they usually occur in roughly the following sequence. Although there can be more than one motivation for asking a question, a bit of introspection will reveal the core of what you are searching for. Shock: “How could you do this!?” “How could this have happened!?” “Do you have any idea…
Can you? Is this possible? Many writers present plans that are supposed to be near fool-proof. Some are aimed at husbands; some are aimed at wives. Do this, be that way, and you can prevent your partner from straying. It’s appealing, and, on the whole,
Everyone has their own personal beliefs about affairs. These beliefs can stem from how we saw adults around us behaving with each other during our childhood. They can stem from how our parents and other relatives talked about and regarded affairs, from the particular culture you grew up in, and your religious upbringing and beliefs. Sometimes beliefs about affairs are really rationalizations that allow the affair to go on. If you really believe these things, than you don’t feel that…
It can be confusing to know that you have betrayed your partner’s trust, to see him or her so devastated, and yet be unable to feel true remorse. This lack of remorse can be the final nail in the coffin of a marriage. You can see that it leaves your partner feeling more betrayed, enraged, disgusted, and/or withdrawn. You can see their panic and feel the tenuous threads holding you together fraying. What you might not know or want to…
The discovery of an affair is traumatic for everyone involved. However, there are important things you can do to help your partner heal over time. It can be useful to think about trauma as something that actually wants to heal. If provided with the appropriate conditions, it frequently does. Your partner probably feel that his or her world, life, identity, and marriage has been shattered. Natural reactions include feeling betrayed, panicked, rageful and vengeful, and ultimately very deep, and previously…
Whether you are the other person, the discoverer, or the discovered, virtually all of your relationships have been altered by the affair. Especially at first, the impulse to keep the affair a secret is usually very strong. Certainly, the person having the affair doesn’t want anyone to know, and the secrecy can even add excitement to the affair relationship. However, if you are feeling conflicted about the affair, it may be painful