Marriage Counseling After Infidelity: Part 1

Infidelity and adultery are surprisingly common practices in modern day marriages. An estimated 22% of married men and 14% of married women admit to having an affair in their marriage, and 17% of divorces in the US are the result of infidelity. While this may seem like a deal-breaker in most relationships, marriage counseling after infidelity may help you and your spouse overcome this troubling time in your relationship and rebuild what you once had. Work with someone to avoid divorce and remind yourselves of why you got together in the first place.

Cheating Happens For A Reason

People are not naturally inclined to cheat. They seek out an affair to fill a void in their lives. This is not to say that all adulterers are unhappy in their relationships. In fact, many people who cheat say that they love the way their marriages run. That love just wasn’t strong enough to keep them from wanting more.

Through your marriage counseling, you can get to the root of the problem and figure out what sparked the need to cheat in the first place. Did the cheating spouse feel neglected, under appreciated, sexually undesired, mistreated, ignored…? What did the affair provide that the marriage wasn’t providing? The two of you can work with a counselor to assess what the core issue was/is and what you can do as a couple to correct it.

This Is Not A Blame Game

Marriage counseling is not about putting the blame on one person or another. At home, your fights may consist of frequent finger-pointing and hurtful accusations. The cheating spouse may blame the other spouse for not giving him/her enough attention or not communicating enough, while the non-cheating spouse may blame the entire situation on the adulterer’s inability to control his/her emotions.

The “blame game” is not a healthy way to resolve matters in a relationship, especially ones as severe as this. Marriage counseling and therapy aims to put each of you on an equal playing field so you can work together to solve your problems. This process is not designed to punish the cheating spouse or badger the non-cheating spouse, but rather join the two of you together to get through issues as a team. With a solid support system in your marriage, you will be able to overcome infidelity and prevent it from happening again in the future.

Continue to Part 2