Has anyone successfully recovered from infidelity with couple’s therapy?

[TreadingTrepidatious]

Infidelity was discovered within my marriage last night, and we have an appointment with a marriage counselor on the 24th (which feels like forever away!). Just wondering if it’s helped anyone to get their marriage back to a good place, and if you’d be willing to talk about the process. Thanks in advance

I don’t want people’s opinions on my situation specifically. I appreciate the answers I’ve been given which share others’ experiences with counseling and have directed me to helpful resources.

There is no definition of love that involves being betrayed and disrespected. One of the most stupid things I’ve read.

@Allthegoodonesareg0ne haters gonna hate (I have my own theories as to why these posters are so utterly vile about women who reconcile). Please ignore the nasty comment after your heartfelt message. as I have said I know plenty of reconciled, happy couples. Healing does take time and most describe the other side as ‘acceptance’ rather than ‘forgiveness’ which I think is a great way to think about it. I’d caution against Esther Perel as she is marmite. Some couples like her but many betrayed find her too ‘marriage blaming’ and too excuse making for the cheat.

@TreadingTrepidatious i can understand why you haven’t declared who you are in this situation but as i have said I would definitely seek advice on surviving infidelity on the right board. I do think affair recovery videos are good too. How you both handle this now is key. I will repeat that couples counselling may be premature. I know one of you has only just found out so be aware that one of you has had a massive head start and the other will be reeling and the level headedness of the last few days may give way to trauma and shock. They will need huge amounts of support from the other in whatever form that comes.

Op, I'm sorry if it is you they is enduring this utter misery of betrayal.

To stay together, the person who was cheated on has to do the work. Swallow the anger, the hurt, the anxiety about their partner doing it again.

It's horrible. And unfair.

My ex cheated on me in 2014. I had to go to therapy to deal with the distress. I was trying really hard to make things work. He said he was. Not really.

He kept on cheating from 2018 onwards.

It ruins you. The effects are psychologically so damaging and painful.

And you are very very important. Far too important for some cheating, self indulgent little man (and cheaters are very little people, I've found) to be your priority.

Make yourself your priority and protect yourself from further pain and mental distress by getting this person out of your life.

They don't stop cheating just because you're trying hard to make things work.

That is not they is

I agree with you @Piggled However, people don’t always like to hear the truth.

I’m still suspicious that this thread isn’t actually real and that it’s the same poster who shagged a 24 year old behind her husband’s back. But hey, who am I to say 🤷‍♀️

You want to control the narrative you mean. You don't seem to feel sorry for what you have done, you just want your partner to get over it with a therapy quick fix. I do hope he sees through your shenanigans.

Thank you. I really appreciate that. I can see how EP is marmite, I know in the reconciliation communities a lot find her view difficult. I think for me, because I read a lot and I was interested to put together the whole story of the affair and all the contributory factors I could put her thoughts into context.
I knew the affair was not my fault, he had many choices and the one he took was immensely selfish and hurtful, but I also was able to acknowledge that it occurred within a context - I say that without taking any responsibility for the affair.
I think some people miss that we know the person who hurt us very well. I had to trust that I know his nature, his qualities and his flaws and figure things out from there.
It's a shame that because of people like the pp many who reconcile keep their experiences to themselves. It'd never judge someone for leaving a cheating partner - all our circumstances are different and I certainly explored, and still explore sometimes that option. But there certainly is a way forward for a couple that wants that.

I know quite a few long term married couples where there was infidelity and they buried it and moved on. It does remain a marriage but it’s never the same. The betrayal is buried but it doesn’t mean it’s still not festering and mouldering in the dark.

To answer the question, I think a marriage can survive but it’s likely going to be extremely damaged. A lot depends on the circumstances too - was it a stupid drunken encounter or a sustained affair. Did the person who had the affair ‘own up’ or was it discovered? So many variables and everyone person is different so it’s very hard for anyone to predict what will happen in your relationship.

I know 3 relationships where there was infidelity. Some limped on for a while but in the end, all of the relationships failed. Once trust is broken, it’s almost impossible to get back.

It doesn't necessarily get buried or forgotten.

It's not the same marriage. There is a marriage before and a marriage after. The marriage after is definitely different.

I don't think he'll be able to forgive you and move on. You're rushing him to couples counselling to try to repair this.
If the cheating only came out, first he'll be sad, shortly he'll be angry.
Why did you cheat to begin with?.

I misread it and thought your husband was the cheat.

Yes I know lots of couples that have repaired their relationship after a betrayal. The successful ones the one who betrayed does their own individual therapy first. Before they are anywhere near doing couples counselling together. The betrayed partner can also have individual therapy during this time. It's predominantly men that have betrayed in these circumstances i know of. They often have wider issues to work through. Often abuse accompanies it. Gaslighting deception, hiding. They have to re learn intimacy empathy communication, lots of new skills. This can take a good two to three years minimum but it's a lifelong process of everyday choosing radical honesty, transparency and trust. A relationship after betrayal is forever changed but that isn't necessarily a bad thing. Some of the strongest relationship with the most depth to them I know are those that survived betrayal and rebuilt from scratch again.

It only works if the betrayer is all in from the start of the process. If they aren't it tends to do further or more damage than even the affair/betrayal. There needs to be a period of time where the betrayer accepts they are in a one down position. But that eventually returns to equality within a new set of boundaries both agree on. There is also a large period of grief. To grieve the end of a old relationship. To grieve a confusing dual reality. There might be triggers that need to have a plan to manage ,events that need a plan prepared before depending on the circumstances.

It is an intense process. But done right it absolutely can be done. Finding the right therapist is crucial it's better to go through 10 to find the right person than to stick with one that's not right.

All the therapy in the world won’t make your cheating partner actually, genuinely love you.

Great post and very true. My ex H had an affair and was caught out. We tried to make it work but he was not interested and I doubt I would ever have trusted him as he had no intention of making changes.

it was the most hurtful thing I’ve ever had done to me. Someone who is meant to live your life, who you trust, chooses to lie. Not once but over a period of time. Dreadful thing to do to someone. Just own it and finish the relationship.

Yes agree from experience. The cheater must want to do the work from the right place - not from a sense of shame, which is a selfish starting point. The cheated on should be given the courtesy to have the space/support to process what has upturned their life. So IC for both partners is probably best before entering into couples. I wish we had done that as subsequently has been as damaging to the attempts at the "new" marriage.
And as the variety of answers show, there is no right or wrong answer as each situation is a different context involving people with different beliefs and values. You just have to find what works for you, which IME is incredibly hard. Good luck as I wouldn't wish experiencing this life event on either party.

There is a difference between feeling love for somebody, and feeling loved by somebody. A cheating person might behave selfishly and do things that hurt their partner , but that doesn’t necessitate that they don’t feel love for the hurt partner still. The hurt partner might not feel loved by the cheating partner as a result of their actions.

I think that’s a very important distinction.

Now, one can choose to forgive the cheating partner and remain together because they believe the cheating partner still loves them despite their behavior, or one could choose to leave, not feeling loved or not believing that the cheating partner loves them. But people can only speak to their own feelings. Again, what ‘love’ as a general concept actually feels like and looks like in practice varies from individual to individual. One person cannot define love as a whole with any sort of authority.

Yes, “I lied to you, destabilised your sense of reality, destroyed your security and safety, betrayed you, exposed you to venereal
disease, and humiliated you. But I still feel love for you. So it’s fine.”

Nah I think you can safely objectively say that’s not love. But you carry on pretending otherwise.

Again, I will not be saying which one of us did the cheating. It doesn’t matter for the purpose of this thread. The cheater is sorry and is taking accountability for what happened in real life, and we both desire therapy to help us navigate this. Neither of us owes repentance, nor the narrative you seem to expect, to anyone in this online space.

To be fair, you’re not wrong. The cheating spouse however owes enormous repentance to the wrong partner, full accountability and taking full responsibility. Not one single if, but, or maybe. An awful lot of cheaters have lied to themselves to justify their behaviour so when they get caught? They come out with the same (utter nonsense) justifications because they don’t want to acknowledge the sheer horror of what they’ve done. That just does more damage and is to be avoided if possible, if there is to be any hope of reconciliation.

The person who cheated doesn’t get to say “It’s fine,” because it’s not fine, and it’s not for them to decide.

But just the same as only the betrayed partner can say whether or not it’s fine, or whether they want to remain in a relationship with the cheater, only the cheater can say how s/he feels internally. If the cheater says they still love the betrayed partner, the betrayed partner can’t argue that the cheater doesn’t actually feel that way. Only that the betrayed partner doesn’t feel loved, or that s/he doesn’t accept this kind of behavior from partners.

If I say to you, “Purple is my favorite colour,” it would be insane to say “No, you don’t feel that way. Purple is not your favorite colour; if it was you would wear purple clothing every day,” because you are not the arbiter of what having a favorite colour means, nor are you privy to anyone else’s internal feelings.

What a ridiculous comparison. What you’re describing is more akin to saying ‘the sky is not blue’ when objectively, to everyone else who can see it, it is.
You’re saying love is incapable of being objectively evaluated and that simply isn’t true.
The way people experience love may be subjective but it is still within the bounds of a universally agreed definition which is, you don’t intentionally betray, lie to, humiliate and expose someone you love to physical and emotional harm of extreme magnitude.

you are likely the cheater and frantically trying to justify your actions (and good luck to you spouse with this ridiculous gaslighting claptrap you’re coming out with) or the betrayed and frantically trying to find ways of denying and minimising so you can stay and avoid facing up to the truth. Either way good luck to you.

There is little chance of 💯 forgiveness.
No such thing as forgive and forget when it involved creating.
The betrayal would cut deep, the trust cannot be restored, every time the cheater was late or friendly, your mind would spiral.

It is clear that you cheated. Why? What happened? Boredom? New love interest? No sex life? Lack of connection with partner?

Whether couples counselling is going to work for you or not I don't know. I would say however that your waiting time would be best spent either talking to your partner or examining what's going on in your own head, heart and relationship.

Arguing about the definition of love with strangers on the internet probably isn't helping.