As couples reach the final stage of the recovery process, their love has begun to be renewed and they feel closer than they have for a long time. There is a lot to celebrate but many people feel uncertain or worried: “What if we slip back?,” “How can I be sure it won’t happen again?,” or “I can see myself starting to trust again but it’s still hard.” If this sounds familiar, rest assured. It is common to have doubts or a small crisis of confidence toward the end of the journey. The best way to address these fears is to look at the major reasons that people stray and inoculate your relationship against them. Turkish psychologists Zuhal Yenicen and Dogan Kokdemir asked over four hundred students (a mixture of those who were single, in a relationship, and a few who were married) about infidelity. Thirty-six percent had direct experience of infidelity either as the “betrayer” or the “betrayed” and overall, the students gave a hundred different reasons for being unfaithful (Social Behavior and Personality, 2006). The answers were grouped into six categories and ranked from most to least common:
Legitimacy
• Partner does not show any involvement in the relationship
• Seeing no future in the relationship
• Partner is insensitive
• Relationship is a mistake
• For revenge
• This justification was more likely to be used by women
Seduction
• The “betrayer” was led on by someone beautiful or handsome
• Overwhelming desire for another person
• This justification was more likely to be used by men
Normalization
• It’s fashionable
• Everybody’s doing it
• A natural human right
• Men thought this a reason for women to commit adultery
Sexuality
• Having a poor sexual relationship
• Partner unwilling to have sexual relations
• Partner made unjustified sexual demands (for example, a taboo activity)
• Interestingly, men used this justification and projected their feelings on to women and wrongly imagined that this factor was important for them too
Social background
• Married too young
• Growing up in a conservative social culture
• Having too few romantic relationships during adolescence
Sensation
• Seeking enjoyment
• Boredom with routine life
In my opinion, the top two reasons, legitimacy and seduction, are the most important. In effect, normalization and social background would not come into play unless the straying partner did not feel that he or she had legitimate reasons. Likewise, someone is only vulnerable to being seduced if there are sexuality or sensation issues in their relationship. So how can you use this knowledge to protect your relationship? Later in the chapter, I will explain how to deal with seduction (the three fundamentals of a good sex life), but first it is important to build a strong foundation and improve communication to counteract legitimacy.
The four fundamentals of a good relationship
As Leo Tolstoy famously wrote at the beginning of his novel Anna Karenina: “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” But what qualities do these happy families share which allow them to work through their problems rather than be sunk by them? Unfortunately, happy families provide little drama and therefore seldom appear in books or movies. Fortunately, I have had the privilege of helping hundreds of couples shift from being unhappy to happy. I know my task is complete when they begin to acquire and value these four key skills:
Listening and talking
The first skills will come as no surprise. When many couples arrive in my therapy office, one partner will complain: “He never talks to me” or “She shuts me out.” Talking about problems is important, but this truth has become so self-evident that many people overlook the equally vital skill of listening. Time and again, the person complaining that their partner is uncommunicative, and never tells them anything, will interrupt when he or she begins to open up! (In the talker’s mind, there is just one more important fact or example that needs to be communicated before she or he can listen.) Meanwhile, the quieter partner feels persecuted and becomes more and more silent. However, the better a talker becomes at listening, in turn, the better the other partner will become at communicating. Here are a few tips:
• A good listener is prepared to hear things that are uncomfortable or unpleasant.
• A good listener will ask for more information and check they have heard correctly and not jump to conclusions.
• A good listener will not use the time their partner is speaking to rehearse their side of the argument.
• A good listener will first accept that their partner’s viewpoint is valid (from where he or she is standing) and then give his or her contrary opinion.
Once the matching skills of listening and talking are in place, it is extraordinary how much each partner will open up and how much can be achieved.
Paul and Tracey, whom we met in chapters two, four, and six, discovered a lot when they talked and listened to each other about their previous sexual partners. “The subject had been off-limits before,” said Tracey, “not so much out of jealousy but because of our own insecurity.” So what had they discovered? “I’d only had sex on two occasions when I didn’t think or hope that this would be a long-term relationship and afterward I felt dirty and degraded,” she explained.
“I’d been brought up a good Catholic and the reverend brothers had made sure that we didn’t stray,” said Paul. “So when I got to the freedom of university, I went wild and put it around quite a lot.”
Listening to Paul, Tracey began to understand that although she could not separate love and sex, for Paul it was something different: “It was just a physical act.” This provided her with a fresh perspective on his infidelity. “It’s not like he bought her presents or took her off somewhere special—that’s the sort of thing that would really have upset me.”
Accepting that your partner has a different take on something important—and learning to live with that difference—is a very adult take on life and it provided Paul and Tracey with an important building block in their recovery. The final piece of learning was more for Paul than for Tracey. “I remember the atmosphere in the house when my mother didn’t ‘put out’—she was terrified of getting pregnant again—and how resentful my Dad would get. I’d also notice—over Christmas and Easter when we were around more—how the mood would lighten if she relented.” As an adult, Paul had also sulked if Tracey was too tired or not interested. “It made me realize that I’d acted as if I was entitled, which is not really the right approach for fulfilling lovemaking.”
Bringing up problems and containing
How well a couple settle disputes—rather than their compatibility, similar values, or a healthy sex life—is the best indicator of which relationships will thrive and which will fail. Psychologist John Gottman, from the University of Washington in Seattle, set up a marital lab—a comfortably furnished apartment with kitchen, living room, and bedroom—not only to watch couples interact but also to monitor their heart rates, pulse, and how much they sweat under stress. After studying two thousand married couples over twenty years, he claims a 94 percent accuracy in predicting who will stay married. Gottman not only refutes the idea that frequent arguments lead to divorce but also goes one step further: “Occasional discontent, especially during a marriage’s early years, seems to be good for the union in the long run.”
In every relationship, one partner tends to bring up issues; yet the other’s role is equally important but often misunderstood. Liza and Bob are in their late twenties, and like many couples complained about “communication problems”—normally a code for “our arguments solve nothing.” In their first counseling session, Bob looked virtuous: “If something needs to be said, I will be the one to do it.” He then cast Liza in the role of villain: “but she would much rather sweep everything under the carpet.”
Liza said nothing, just looked at the floor as if she expected me to tell her off. After some coaxing, she began to defend herself. “Sometimes Bob loses it about the most stupid things,” she said, “what’s the point of getting wound up about rotating food in the freezer? Life is too short.” Liza was in fact providing something just as important as raising issues: a sense of proportion.
Although I hate sporting metaphors, cricket does help explain the two argument roles in a successful relationship. The person who raises issues is the bowler. The other half who contains issues—or the couple would spend all the time arguing—is the batter. The batter can choose just to block the ball (avoid a row) or hit it for six (and start a row). Although traditionally women might have raised issues and men contained, today the roles are fully interchangeable. Like with cricket, couples can also switch over, so that each partner has an innings of batting and bowling.
Bob and Liza had come into counseling after he had an affair with a work colleague. Naturally, he felt very guilty about how much he’d hurt Liza. He was keen to dig down into his childhood and wondered if he had “inherited” his unfaithfulness from his father who also had numerous affairs. He also wanted to understand the roots of each and every one of their arguments—which he normally attributed to his infidelity. I knew they were making progress when Liza stopped him: “Not everything is connected to your affair. I would like to have an argument that was just about”—and she threw out an example—“whether it’s my turn to empty the dishwasher or yours, rather than about your affair. And as for worrying about your father, can’t we just concentrate on living our lives?” In effect, Liza had contained their problems.
Both bringing up problems and containing them are equally important. If both partners contain, everything is buried. If both partners bring up problems, so much time is spent analyzing that the couple becomes hypersensitive and fractious.
“We” and “I”
Although it is important for couples to spend quality time together, it is equally important for each partner to have time for her or himself. Getting the balance right is hard because it is just as harmful to be too interdependent as too independent. I have counseled couples who agreed, for example, never to spend a night apart. When they made the vow, it had seemed very romantic. However, by the time they came to my office it had began to feel very claustrophobic.
“I wanted to take my trampoline exams, so I could start to teach,” explained Virginia, forty-five, “but one of the modules was residential. I knew he’d get moody and, quite frankly, it wasn’t worth the agro.” She hadn’t taken the course and had started to resent her husband, Alistair: “He’s holding me back and stopping me from being myself.” Alistair was prepared for her to go away but thought it was a pity that she didn’t want to spend more time as part of the family: “The kids are still at the age when they want to be with us. It won’t last forever.”
However, in the Intense Learning stage of recovery, each partner begins to take responsibility for their own happiness—rather than just blaming the other. Certainly, this is what happened with Virginia and Alistair. “I realized it’s not up to Alistair to make me happy,” said Virginia, “I’ve got to do that for myself. I could stand up for what I need rather than keeping quiet and being resentful—because that’s what began to make me feel I deserved the happiness I thought I was getting from my lover.” Meanwhile, Alistair had begun to think about his own needs and not just the couple’s needs: “There’re things I want to do—like go to the baseball—which don’t interest either my wife or my daughters.” They had begun to balance the “I” and the “we.”
In most cases, couples who are too independent—and have forgotten the “we” in their relationship—have already recognized the need to spend more time together before reaching my offices. So these couples are generally easier to help. If this is you, agree on a regular time to be together—for example, every Wednesday night—and jealously guard it. Otherwise, ferrying the children around, working late, or one partner’s social activities will sabotage your couple time.
Achieving balance
One of the themes in this book, and indeed in all my writing, is the importance of a balanced relationship. Unfortunately, when couples are in crisis, each partner becomes a more extreme version of themselves. For example, if someone usually brings up problems, he or she will raise hundreds of them in crisis. Meanwhile, their partner will be containing even more. In fact, the more problems one half brings up, the more the other will feel the need to contain (otherwise it will be problems morning, noon and night) and this will make the other even more anxious and determined to talk (if I don’t raise this problem, nothing will ever be solved). Remember how couples can sometimes get stuck on a seesaw argument: the more one half pushes down on her or his end, the higher the other goes up. To achieve a more comfortable position, each partner must stop pushing down on their respective end and find balance. For example, once Virginia no longer felt that she needed to guard her personal time so tightly, she was keener on couple time. Conversely, once Alistair stopped guarding couple time, he could recognize the virtue of personal time and his own particular needs.
Looking at achieving balance after infidelity, Jane, forty-five, learnt that there was such a thing as having too high self-esteem: “I was very complacent and rather arrogant before my husband’s affair. I had such a high opinion of myself that if there was a problem—it had to be down to someone else.” In contrast, Alan, forty-one, had very low self-esteem: “If I felt rejected or not appreciated by Jane, I wouldn’t say anything but kept it stored in a dark place inside and used that resentment to justify being unfaithful and my other weaknesses.”
Through counseling, Jane learnt not only to show her approval but also how much she valued Alan. Meanwhile, Alan learnt that being selfish did not help him feel better about himself: “I needed to grow some balls and stand up for myself.” Jane thought for a moment and concluded: “I’ve stopped hiding behind my ‘I’m perfect’ front and become, I suppose, more human.” They had achieved a more balanced relationship without the extremes of high and low self-esteem.
Returning to Robert and Rosie, the child-centered couple from the previous chapter, their relationship became more balanced too during the Intense Learning stage: “When we got married, it was like a fairy tale come true,” said Rosie, “he was rescuing me from my parents who argued like cat and dog. I felt like Cinderella.” That, of course, made Robert into Prince Charming—someone who had to carry the load of always being perfect. They had got married when Rosie was nineteen and in many ways he had always been “in charge.” The couple decided it was time to have a more balanced relationship and set time aside every evening to listen to each other’s daily concerns. By taking on her share of responsibility for what went wrong, Rosie no longer felt like a little girl—at the mercy of Robert’s behavior—and more in charge of her own life.
The three fundamentals of a good sex life
Having covered the qualities that make someone less vulnerable to having an affair for legitimacy reasons, we move on to the second part of inoculating your relationship by looking at how to guard against seduction. David Blanchflower, the British-born economist from Dartmouth College in New Hampshire, is an expert on data and spreadsheets. However, he does not only use this knowledge to predict slumps and forecast the impact of changes in interest rates, he is also interested in predicting happiness and life satisfaction. He has calculated that a good regular sex life is worth $75,000 a year, and it’s equally important for men and women. This figure underlines just how vital feeling sexually vibrant is to our overall well-being and conversely just how poor we feel if something is lacking in our love life.
In the eighties, journalist Alexandra Penney’s partner was unfaithful and part of her healing process was to interview two hundred men and ask if they had cheated on their partner and why. The top five reasons were as follows:
1. Curiosity
2. Need for variety
3. Sexual frustration
4. Boredom
5. Need for acceptance and recognition
What about women? In the nineties, Ebony magazine asked both their readers and therapists for the most common reasons why women cheat. The top five were as follows:
1. A self-esteem boost
2. Emotional neglect
3. Revenge
4. Seeking excitement
5. Seduction and romance
As you might expect, there are marked differences between men and women’s reasons for infidelity. However, there is some important overlap. “Self-esteem boost” is similar to “need for acceptance and recognition” while ‘seeking excitement” is another way of discussing “boredom.” The seventh most common reason for women cheating is “sexual deprivation,” the parallel problem to men’s “sexual frustration.” So with this research in mind, I have created these three rules:
Allow each other to let off steam
• Talk about celebrities or strangers on the street whom each of you find attractive. Being honest about what turns you on can defuse the fireworks of secret sexual fantasies.
• Tease each other about your passion for Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie, or whoever. This kind of banter allows us to see ourselves and our partners as desirable and passionate people—which is vital for our sexual confidence and overall happiness.
• Allow each other a little mild flirtation at parties. The appreciative glance and the interested laugh is a great ego boost, plus seeing that other people find your partner attractive can also reignite your own passion for him or her too.
Tell your partner how wonderful he or she is
• Your partner needs to feel that he or she is the best lover in the world. So give lots of feedback—both verbally and physically.
• Give your partner plenty of compliments about his or her body. Even though your partner will probably laugh or disagree. The fact that you appreciate, for example, his or her bottom will increase overall confidence in the bedroom.
• Be proud of your partner’s achievements and don’t be afraid to voice them. Many people are reticent because they are afraid of gushing or appearing insincere. However, I am not suggesting making things up, just telling your partner your regular private thoughts: “You work really hard for us and I want to tell you how grateful I am,” “You handled that really well—you’re a great father,” or “I know it’s taken a toll on you visiting my mother in hospital so often, but I want to tell you that I’ve been really impressed with your patience.”
• Offer proof of just how wonderful you think your partner is with small acts of appreciation or service. For example, nipping out to buy fresh rolls for her sandwiches or bringing him fresh coffee in bed.
• With your partner feeling both desired and cherished at home, there is no reason why she or he would respond to flattery from someone else.
Let lovemaking become an adventure
• Many people imagine that this involves dressing up, adult toys, bondage, and S/M and immediately close their minds to experimentation. If any of these interest you and your partner, that’s fine. However, this is not what I’m talking about. The aim is to bring the element of surprise to your lovemaking.
• This can be altering the places where you make love: not just in the bedroom but in the shower, taking a blanket into the woods on a hot summer’s evening, or renting a four-poster bed in a country house hotel.
• Being adventurous is being mysterious and never letting your partner know what to expect next. For example, if you have a favorite technique for oral sex use it two times out of three but on the third put in a twist and add something different. For example, what about putting an ice cube in your mouth?
• Look around your house and find other props and tricks to play on each other. What is there in the refrigerator that you could pour over each other and lick off?
• However, the best aphrodisiac is a turned-on partner, so do not be pressured into doing anything which makes you uncomfortable.
• A partner who is getting loving and adventurous sex will not be tempted by anyone else.
With your overall confidence in the relationship boosted and a more fulfilling sex life in place, it is time to move on to the penultimate ingredient for recovery.
True forgiveness
There is a difference between forgiving your partner enough to try again and the true forgiveness necessary to make infidelity a closed subject. To achieve true forgiveness, there are four ingredients. While the first two are helpful for recovery, it is essential that you embrace the last two:
Reparation
Look at what will repair the damage caused by the affair. Sometimes it might be something practical—replacing the car which had been defiled by illicit lovemaking with the third party, or apologizing to your parents for the upset caused. For other couples, it will be something material—jewelry or a romantic trip. If your partner has not made amends, think of something that will help you move forward and tell him or her. Do not expect your partner to be a mind reader.
Letting go of any anger toward the third party
It is natural to be angry with the other woman or man. However, by this stage in your recovery, it should be possible to look past your first reactions. Alan and Jane were keen to put the affair behind them. They had already taken a four-day trip to Vienna—partly as a celebration of their love surviving and partly as reparation. During this vacation, Jane decided to write a letter to the other woman: “Not in anger—because there was a time when I wanted to go to her place and cause a fuss—but to draw a line in the sand and move on.” She read the letter out in counseling and although there was some bitterness—“Have you any idea what it was like to discover that Alan had brought you to my home and that you’d had sex just inches away from my clothes? I’d call that defilement”—there was also a hint of forgiveness: “I am aware that you have been hurt too.”
I could understand why she might want to write a letter but less certain about posting it, so Jane explained: “I wanted her to know that we were back together and doing well, partly so she didn’t hang around hoping that we would implode and Alan would come back. Mainly, I wanted to show her that I knew everything as Alan had been completely honest with me and she had no ‘secrets’ that she could hold over me.” The final paragraph of the letter described Jane and Alan’s renewed love for each other, an acknowledgment that the other woman had been hurt too and a definite sense of forgiveness. “Perhaps not just yet, but it’s on the horizon,” said Jane.
Putting aside the unhelpful myths about forgiveness
There are many reasons why you might be finding it hard to forgive. Here are just a few myths which make it harder to move on:
• Forgiveness will let my partner off the hook or excuse his or her bad behavior. (This might have been the case if you had immediately forgiven without going through the previous six steps, but by this point in the journey your partner should have earned forgiveness.)
• My partner might do it all over again. (This myth suggests that punishment is the only way to keep someone faithful. It also places a permanent barrier between you and your partner, and stops healing.)
• He or she does not deserve to be forgiven. (If this is how you feel, you have probably not truly reached Stage Seven. This is also a sign that your partner has not answered all your questions about the affair, so it might be a good idea to reread Stage Two: Intense Questioning.)
• Forgiving means forgetting and I could never do that. (The memories will remain but forgiving takes away their continued power to hurt.)
• I can only forgive if certain conditions are met—for example, a full apology is given. (There is more about apologies in the box for the Discovered at the end of this chapter.)
• People will criticize me if I forgive. (I have two thoughts for you. First, have you kept your family and friends abreast of your progress or do they still picture you at the beginning of the journey? How could you update them? Second, you cannot please everyone.)
After having looked at what forgiveness is not about, it is time to focus on what it really means. If forgiveness is truly given—and not coerced—it allows us to let go of resentment, blame, and anger. Therefore, forgiveness is not just an act of generosity to our partner but also a gift to ourselves. This is because it frees us from the past, allows us to draw a line, and to start afresh. Finally, forgiving our partner makes it easier to forgive ourselves too.
Identifying the lessons and the gifts
At the beginning of this book, I talked about the danger and the opportunity in the crisis of infidelity. The opportunity is to learn some important lessons (something that can be applied in the future) and to gain some useful gifts (new perspectives or greater wisdom). If you are still finding it hard to reach true forgiveness, looking at your lessons and gifts will help.
When Judy, forty-five, discovered her husband’s two-year affair, with a woman whose children went to the same school as their own, she was furious. Particularly as they had already been in marital therapy for a year. She even started looking at revenge websites. Fortunately, she found my book (I Love You But I’m Not in Love with You), read it in five hours and decided that there should be a way to make things better. She also filled in my research into infidelity survey and identified the following learning about herself: “I should have been more open, told my husband that I disliked certain things, argued more with him—and because I didn’t do that enough I was angry a lot of the time and, therefore, couldn’t give him intimacy any more.” With this story in mind, what have you learnt, what gifts (however unwanted) have you received, and what more learning could you do?
The majority of people in my survey learnt something positive from infidelity. The most common lesson—25 percent of the sample —was “I’m stronger.” To reflect the spread of opinions, I have grouped the responses into four categories:
Positive personal lessons
Fifty-five percent were upbeat. After “I’m stronger,” the most common lessons were: “I can forgive” and “I need to be myself.” Other positive lessons included: “I am not a victim” and “It’s okay to be sad and cross but don’t let it ruin your day.”
Negative personal lessons
These responses made up 18 percent and underline how painful infidelity can be. The most common reply was “I’m stupid” (7 percent of the total sample), followed by “I lack confidence.” Other examples include: “Although I thought I was strong and happy, I am a weak and lonely woman,” “My capacity to forgive is huge but to forget is minute and my ability to keep up appearances is remarkable,” and “I can bury my head in the sand and jog along.”
Aspirations for the future
This group comprised 15 percent of the sample. The most common replies were “I need to confront more” and “I must work harder at my marriage.” Other examples include: “I need to be more open to more people and speak more of my emotions. I was like Mr. Spock, very little emotion would seep out of me.”
Lessons about marriage and life in general
The final category has 12 percent of people in it. The most common lesson was about the importance and reliability of friends. Others include: “Marriage is the most important thing,” “I can’t sort out my partner’s life for him,” and the value of “honesty, fairness, and truthfulness.” One of the most interesting replies came from someone who had been unfaithful: “I am happy with my lot in life and don’t need to be chasing after rainbows or the grass-is-greener scenario and how many people can honestly say that?”
How to trust again
As this book is called How Can I Ever Trust You Again?, there should be a long section on how to regain trust. However, over the past three stages, some key elements of your recovery have been put in place. During Stage Four (Hope), your partner will have offered or agreed to be more transparent about his or her movements. Your partner should have cut off all contact with the third party and shown a commitment to put that relationship behind her or him by answering all your questions about the affair. During Stage Five (Attempted Normality), communication between the two of you should have improved. During Stage Six (Despair—Bodies Float to the Surface), your partner has shown a commitment to settle long-running disputes and lay the foundations for a renewed relationship. Finally, in this stage, you have begun to focus on temptation and to inoculate your relationship against future sexual problems.
Under these circumstances, trust should fall automatically into place. Often it happens so quietly that many people only realize after the fact. Perhaps their partner is late home and they are busy and don’t notice the time. It is only later that they register the absence of the clenched gut or racing mind.
How can you tell when you’ve begun to trust again? The best indicator that the crisis is over is, when the two of you can start planning or dreaming about the future together. Previously, these thoughts will have been fantasy and part of your private daydreams. Once trust has returned, ideas are openly discussed and there are concrete plans for a future together.
What if all the ingredients of trust are in place but something is holding you back? “I want to trust and Lyle has been quite sweet; he’s given me his password and I can read his emails and check his phone,” says Candice, twenty-eight, “and he seems genuinely sorry. I believe the affair is over but I can’t let go. I keep on and on at Lyle and I’m worried that it’s driving us apart.” So I suggested that Candice tried an alternative strategy for two weeks. I call this strategy “Act as if.” Instead of worrying that he might be unfaithful, she had to think: “What would I do if I trusted him?” And then follow up by turning this imagined behavior into reality. The experiment was an almost immediate success. The temperature in their household lowered. Lyle was more open—he no longer expected to be attacked at any moment—and they grew much closer. Before too long, Candice did not need to “act as if” she trusted because she really did.
FOR THE DISCOVERED: INTENSE LEARNING
• This is the final stage in the healing process. Your relationship is much stronger but to reach recovery, there is one final ingredient.
• It will probably feel like you have done nothing but say “sorry” since confessing to your affair or being caught out. However, this is not the same as showing true remorse.
• True remorse involves: understanding what you have done; giving a full account of it; acknowledging how you have damaged other people; giving a detailed description of the effects of your behavior; expressing regret and putting forward a proposal to make amends.
• Anything less will seem, to your partner, like an attempt to wriggle out of the consequences of your infidelity or to fake remorse. For this reason, it is only at the end of the journey that you will have enough knowledge about yourself and your relationship to be able to apologize properly.
• The five necessities for a fulsome apology are: Acknowledge what you did wrong. (For example, “I have cheated and lied not only to you but to the children.”) Accept your responsibility for the inappropriate behavior—without explaining the background, as this can seem like excusing it. (“I was selfish and thought only about myself.”) Hold yourself responsible for the consequences. (“I have hurt you and by not taking proper precautions put your sexual health at risk.”) Express sorrow. (“I am truly sorry and ashamed.”) Explain why it will never happen again. (“I am determined that I will not make the same mistakes again and, for example, I have resolved to come home early on Friday nights rather than socializing with my work colleagues.”)
• A fulsome apology will allow your partner to forgive and finally move on.
• If affairs start when: Problem + Poor Communication + Temptation = Infidelity, what have you learnt about settling future disputes between you and your partner? How has your communication improved for the better? How could you head off temptation in the future? Share your discoveries with your partner.
New skill: Continuous development
Returning to the three fundamental beliefs outlined in the first chapter, which are destroyed by discovering infidelity, how do they look now?
1. The world is meaningful.
2. I am worthy.
3. The world is benevolent.
During this Intense Learning stage, you have looked at just how much you have learnt (however unwillingly) from the affair. In this way, you have begun to find something meaningful from your experiences and a way of imposing meaning on the world. During the journey from discovery to recovery, your self-esteem has been at least partially restored. Just by surviving infidelity you will have discovered reserves of strength and a depth of feeling of which you were probably not aware. You are well on the way to feeling worthy again. The final fundamental belief—the world is benevolent—is harder to reconcile. We want to think that life is good but we know that there are wars, natural disasters, and that people die. As we get older, we have a choice: either we accept that the black-and-white ideas of our childhood need updating or—we can block our ears to the truth and sing “la, la, la.” I believe that accepting that life is both good and bad makes us appreciate the benevolent parts more, and feel less personally affronted when we get our share of the malevolent. Ultimately this makes for a better and more fulfilled life.
Moving on to the particular skill from this stage, continuous development is about growth—for ourselves and our relationship. We want to believe that when Elizabeth marries Mr. Darcy in Pride and Prejudice, when Maria and Baron Von Trapp climb over the mountains at the end of The Sound of Music, and Hugh Grant declares his love for Julia Roberts in Notting Hill, their lives are frozen in happiness—but this is not the whole story. Relationships are living things and cannot stand still. They need continuous development or they risk becoming stale, and possibly withering and dying. This final skill, to keep renewing your relationship, might seem like an effort—and a far cry from a fairy-tale ending—but actually it turns love into an adventure and the most precious gift of all.
Summary
• The two main reasons for people being unfaithful have been addressed—legitimacy and seduction—and the couple have learnt enough so that these are unlikely to be issues again in the future.
• All the problems and uncertainty that were thrown up by discovery have been settled and the world is beginning to look better again.
• The partner who has been unfaithful has made a fulsome and informed apology. Their other half has offered forgiveness.
• Forgiveness is the best way to take the pain out of the past and to move on. In this way, it is the best gift that you can give yourself.
• By this point you are not certain how, but you have started to trust your partner again.
EXERCISES
What do I admire about my partner?
If “being taken for granted” is one of the most common reasons given for adultery, this exercise is the complete opposite. It aims to pinpoint everything that you value about your partner but has somehow fallen beneath your conscious radar.
So take a piece of paper and write the following headings down one side and then return and put something beside each one. Don’t give it too much thought, just put the first thing that comes into your head. If you draw a blank, skip that heading and keep going. Afterward, come back and fill in the blanks. The more headings that you can write something beside, the better.
So what do you admire about your partner?
1. Character
2. At work
3. As a parent or in relation to children
4. Talent
5. Around the house
6. Around the garden/backyard
7. Appearance
8. As a friend
9. Practical matters
10. Emotional matters
11. Attitude to parents
12. Socializing
13. In the wider community or neighborhood
14. Cooking
15. Sport
16. Hobbies
17. Pets
18. Money
19. In adversity
20. Spirituality
If you are working through this book with your partner, you might like to both do this exercise and then show each other the results. Alternatively, use your findings so that you can tell your partner how great he or she is.
Playing devil’s advocate
This exercise is designed to help you break out of the rut of repeating the same row over and over again.
1. Instead of arguing your own viewpoint, take your partner’s side. After all, you’ve heard it often enough.
2. Meanwhile, your partner takes your side and argues your case as strongly as possible.
3. Allow the argument to follow its normal course.
4. Don’t worry if you start to laugh or muck around. There probably is something ridiculous in just how familiar this argument has become.
5. Afterward, discuss the experience. What have you learnt from putting your partner’s case? What points sounded particularly impressive? What had you got wrong? How have your opinions changed?
6. Bring this new knowledge to the next exercise.
Finding a compromise
Compromise is a skill but with a little knowledge and practice, you can learn to stop fighting and find a solution that works for both you and your partner. There are three steps:
1. Put your preconceptions on hold.
• Look at your opinions, principles, and your preferred solution and ask: How important are they to me and why?
• What could be holding you back from reaching a compromise? Do you need to win? Do you feel pressurized into agreeing with your partner (so do so grudgingly or later try to sabotage the plan)?
• Are you fighting about matters of principle? This makes it harder to find common ground because you are expecting your partner to have the same principles. The other problem with principles is that they are always based on past experiences and therefore tend to keep you stuck in the past.
• With a better understanding of what drives your side of the argument, commit to change by deciding to enter into negotiations with no preconceptions.
2. Schedule time to talk.
• Find a time and a place when there will be no interruptions and the children will not be around.
• Listen to your partner.
• If your partner is angry or dismissive, it is easy to respond in kind. However, try and concentrate on the message and not the delivery.
• Afterward summarize your partner’s point. (This is to check that you have not overlaid your own interpretations.)
• Resist the temptation to comment or attack. This will only encourage your partner to defend her or his opinions and make compromise harder.
• Change over and take your turn to talk while your partner listens.
3. Look for solutions.
• You cannot reach a solution until both of you have had your say.
• Many possible compromises are scuttled because one half comes on too strong too soon and their partner feels pressurized into an early decision.
• Brainstorm as many ideas as possible, even if some sound ridiculous. Knowing what the two of you don’t want can sometimes provide a breakthrough.
• Look for alternatives beyond you and your partner’s favorite options.
• Discuss the consequences of each option and which is best.
• Sometimes a compromise is giving up something that you want, sometimes trading (“If you do ‘x,’ I will do ‘y’ . . .”), and sometimes a combination of both.
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CHECKPOINT Three key points for surviving Stage Seven: Intense Learning 1. Balance your relationship by appreciating your partner’s complementary skills. 2. Forgiveness allows you to draw a line in the sand and put the past behind you. 3. The biggest lessons often come from the darkest times. |