Moving Towards Healing After An Infidelity
When you are in a committed relationship or marriage, and there’s been a betrayal, it can be one of the most soul-wrenching experiences of your life. It’s impossible to prepare yourself for that level of betrayal. Infidelity is often described as unfaithfulness in marriage or relationship. The question becomes, what does that look like, or how is that defined? In some cases, it is defined as having a sexual or romantic affair with someone other than one’s spouse without the consent of the spouse. More frequently, it is now including an emotional component of infidelity.
We all know someone who has been impacted by an affair on some level. You likely know someone who has been cheated on, someone who has been in an affair, or some variation thereof. So, the real question comes down to how do you heal from the trauma, negativity, damage, and lingering effects from infidelity?
When you are in a relationship where infidelity has occurred, rarely is all of the information going to come out at once. Many people really do attempt to protect their partners from being further hurt and damaged from knowing all the details, and therefore don’t relinquish all of the details in a transparent manner.
Recognize that it’s essential to make peace with your heart, and trust has been damaged and hurt. When our heart and trust has been damaged, we tend to want to run, hide, and never let these parts of us see the light of day again. That doesn’t lead to true healing. That leads to more damage and more self-harm happening.
One of the most important things, to heal, is to create a supportive network that will be conducive and allow you to heal. This network needs to be built of people that will enable you to talk about all of the details you want or need to talk about or even none of them at all. This network needs to understand they need to follow your lead. For some people, they need to talk about every intimate detail. For some people they need to talk about mindless things like shopping, rearranging furniture, etc. It’s person-specific, and the essential elements are that you have a positive support system.
You must remain aware that there are actual stages of healing from infidelity. If you want to salvage your relationship, I recommend you find a trained professional to help you navigate the speed bumps with their guidance. The important things to keep in mind are: feel free to ask lots of questions, feel your feelings, find support, forgive only when you are ready, spend time together talking about things other than the infidelity.
If you have ever experienced infidelity or suspect infidelity in your relationship, I recommend seeking a licensed and trained mental health professional. We work with people all over Central Illinois and would love to help you too.
For help with any mental health issue, contact The Mental Wellness Center at 309-807-5077 or e-mail info@TheMentalWellnessCenter.com.
