What if you discovered an affair had taken place in your relationship? What if you learned your partner betrayed you by having an affair? Who would you blame here?
The answer seems obvious. Of course you would blame your partner who took the action and stepped outside your relationship! While most people take this stance, getting to the bottom of things warrants further discussion.
Most injured partners believe that their partner has betrayed them, and all the fault belongs to the injuring spouse. The injuring partner no doubt made a devastating choice by betraying their spouse, but can we automatically place all the blame on this person without looking into the relationship further? I don’t think we can and believe that couples must see affairs from a different position than most do.
The Blame Game
Most couples start the process of recovery by getting stuck in the blame game. They argue back and forth about who is to blame for their current situation. The injured partner talks about how hurt they are by the betrayal, and the injuring partner talks about how they felt driven into the arms of another. This back and forth gets the couple nowhere and only serves to cause further disconnection.
A New Strategy
The first thing to do is drop the idea that someone must ‘take the blame’ for all the relationship’s issues. I help couples to adopt a new way of seeing this situation. The couple is educated on the importance of speaking from an open and honest place. The couple is urged to talk openly and honestly about anything relevant to their relationship, past or present.
By using this new strategy, the couple can exit the endless cycle of playing the blame game and can find a new approach to communicating with their partner.
Peeling the Onion
If the focus is not on placing blame what does the focus shift to? Most people boil the reason for the affair down to the injuring partner’s immoral action or their inability to behave in a rational way. This is simply the wrong approach.
Affairs take place for a multitude of reasons. Each partner must take the stance of sharing in the responsibility for the current state of the relationship. It is the job of the couple to gain a thorough understanding of what was happening for each partner before the affair took place, while it was happening, and what they each want moving forward.
This process is much like peeling the layers of an onion. Often the couple must talk about their thoughts, feelings, perceptions, and actions for months before they reach a true understanding of what took place and why. The focus moves from assigning blame to gaining understanding.
Coming Out the Other Side
Once the couple as a detailed understanding of what happened in the relationship and why the affair took place they are moving towards recovery. The couple is aiming to integrate their new knowledge and insights into a narrative that allows them to make sense of what happened while moving forward with a different approach.
How to Get Help
If you have recently discovered an affair or have not properly dealt with the lingering aftermath of an old affair, the first step is reaching out for help. It is imperative that you receive professional counseling to help you deal with the complexities of recovering from an affair. Most couples who attempt to go it alone will end up stuck in an endless cycle of hurting each other.
Look for a professional counselor or therapist who specializes in helping couples recover from affairs. You will need targeted work that many generalist therapists will not be able to provide.
If you are interested in starting the process of recovering from an affair, please call Douglas Counseling as we have a specific Affair Recovery Program that has helped many couples fully recover.
Please call Douglas Counseling at (561) 207-1903 and visit us online at www.DouglasCounseling.com.
