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Divorce and Affair
Divorce and affair: If you are deciding whether to divorce your spouse because he or she had an extramarital affair you
are not alone. One of the major causes of divorce is that an affair occured. Affairs within a marriage are
devastating and can cause a marriage to crumble. You may be feeling distance between yourself and your mate and wondering what does having an affair mean? You may have been suspicious for months and looked for signs of an affair or maybe you had no clue about it and found out through an email, phone, or credit card statement. I am sure none of that matters to you at the moment. I have spent many years dealing with people who were cheated on and no matter how they found out, it was always devastating. It turns
your life upside down. It makes you feel that your marriage of 5,10 or 25 years was a complete lie. You don't know who or what to believe anymore.
So the question is:
Where do you go from here? Do you confront the affair?
If you feel that divorce after an affair is the only answer, then you have to make that choice. The ability to gain back the love and the trust
you once shared is gone. And it is not unusual to feel this way. There are many reasons as to why a spouse becomes unfaithful as each situation is
unique. But two of the most common occurences I find are: 1) There are major problems in the marriage and this is one spouses way of silently screaming "our marriage needs help!!!" 2) The spouse who cheated has emotionally and psychologically separated himself/herself from the marriage and uses infidelity as a way to get out.
If the latter is the case, and one of you really wants out of the marriage, or the ability to forgive is impossible, then all the marriage counseling in the world will not help!(sorry) But you should get counseling for yourself to help deal with your hurt and angry feelings.
If the former is the case, then finding a good therapist to help you deal with the problems in the marriage can really help. But marriage counseling only
helps if both spouses want to make their marriage work.
So there are always other ways. Divorce is not the only answer. Couples do overcome infidelity. Forgiving and forgetting infidelity is never, ever, an easy task. But it can and has been done. And I have helped couples take this travesty and turn it into a growth experience with an even better marriage. Finding a good marriage counselor is key to regaining trust and rebuilding your marriage after an affair. Unfortunately this is not true of every marriage. Sometimes too much damage has been done, there has been too much hurt, lies and pain to overcome the infidelity. Divorce seems iminent. If this is where you are at, then this website should be helpful in dealing with different emotional aspects of divorce and affairs. **This article was written by Melanie Cohn LMSW, a psychotherapist who specializes in relationship issues, infidelity, and divorce. If you live in the metro Detroit area are looking for counseling
click here to contact Melanie Cohn to set up a free phone consultation.
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