Overcoming Infidelity - Can your marriage survive Infidelity?

This week on the blog I've got a little something different for ya! Although I typically show up in your inbox with an article all about relationships and infidelity, I was recently interviewed by Midori Verity who has The Ultimate Relationship Show over on yourtango.com and I wanted to share the interview with all of my readers. 

In the interview I talk about why people cheat, how to avoid infidelity, and how to improve your relationship and heal after infidelity. 

You can get your hands on a copy of the journal prompts that I talk about in the interview by clicking here.  

Just in case, here is the link for the video over on youtube: https://youtu.be/G6w4bQs2rmg

Get my cheat sheet

Am I to blame for my partner’s Affair?

Hindsight is always 20/20. Always. It’s just too easy to look back on an event and not see the signs, find the flubs, and scrutinize the details that were missed.

When you discover that your partner has had an affair, it’s common to press rewind on the last year of your life together and look for all the signs you should have seen and things you missed. The times they were out late and didn’t invite you, the times they were on the phone way too long with their work colleague and you gave them the benefit of the doubt, not wanting to rock the boat.

When hindsight is 20/20, it’s easy to place blame on yourself for missing the signs, or not acknowledging them or acting on your gut feeling in the moment. But the truth is, relationships are generally built on trust and it isn’t foolish to trust someone you love and are committed to.

As much as you’d probably like it to, the past can’t be erased, and the future of your relationship is what matters.

Many times I have clients who say things like, “I guess the last year was just one big lie. When we took that romantic vacation, and he said all those wonderful things to me, it must’ve been a lie!”

I beg to differ. Your partner saying they love you, and having an affair are not dependent upon one another. People can compartmentalize things in such a way that makes this possible. While I acknowledge that it’s confusing, I don’t believe that what is said in a moment of romance between you and your partner isn’t true for them. Just as what’s happening for them in the moments they share with someone they are having an affair with are also very real.

What you do in the aftermath of an affair is what matters most. How you handle and set new boundaries for your partner moving forward is where you can take charge, and ask for what you need.

I have seen clients that feel as though it is now their duty to punish their partner at all costs after discovering their affair. They tell their kids, they tell their friends, their family, and anyone else who will listen in an attempt to get their partner to feel shame for their transgressions.

When this happens, it creates a space that is no longer safe. Trust is one of the most difficult things to rebuild after infidelity, but when the injured partner creates a space of punishment at every corner, things can truly backfire and this often sends the straying partner back into the arms of the other.

So while you are not to blame for your partner straying in the first place, it is your responsibility to create a space and relationship after the affair where communication is open, and you are both able to be authentic as you push towards creating a new normal.

Looking back on the signs that you missed won’t do a lot of good. What will be beneficial is to identify your responsibility and contributions towards the rocky patch in your relationship that lead to your partner’s affair.

Did you stop communicating? Did you put your job ahead of your relationship? Did you stop nurturing the friendship between you and your partner? Once you can identify your role, you will have a good place to start the healing process.

You can only control yourself, and you can only work on changing yourself in the aftermath of an affair. You can change how you relate to your partner, how you communicate with them, and how you show up in your relationship, but without looking at yourself and really taking an inventory of what you need to change, there is no starting point.

Starting over can be a challenge, whether you’re starting over after an affair, or starting over completely, I’d like to help with the launch of my new e-course, The Starting Over Series. To get on the interest list and to receive more details about this at-home course that will be launching in the very near future, click here. 

The Revenge Body: Is it healthy?

The “Revenge Body” is apparently a thing now that Khloe Kardashian has coined it and turned it into a new reality show. It’s quickly becoming a hot topic among those healing after heartbreak, but is it really that healthy?

Exercise in and of itself is great, we all know that we should be getting at least 30 minutes every day, and that we should accompany it with a healthy diet and good sleep. If you’re suffering after a break up though, those things can be difficult to come by. You might find yourself lacking in the sleep department, eating as a means of comfort, and lacking the motivation to get you out of bed and into the gym.

Once you do pick yourself up and begin to heal a bit, hitting the gym and getting your sweat on can make you feel amazing. It creates those wonderful endorphins that send the “happy” signals to our brains, and the strength gained over time can be wonderfully empowering, but just like anything, it has to be done in moderation.

If you’re hitting the treadmill to blow off steam, create a sense of empowerment, and channel anger over the loss of a relationship, it can be easy to become addicted. The concept of the revenge body goes a little deeper than this though – with technology it isn’t just about improving confidence and weight loss, it’s more about flaunting bods in front of exes in hopes of feeling revenge – and that’s where it becomes a problem.

Over-obsession about body image and the premise that this revenge body is being created with the intention of brandishing it for an ex to ooogle over can set you up for some major disappointment.

If exercise has become an outlet for you, so be it. I’ve seen many clients run their first half-marathons, lose a healthy amount of weight, and reinvent themselves after a break-up, but when it borders on obsession and becomes over-consuming it’s no longer healthy.

Pushing yourself hard in the weight room and fantasizing over your ex’s reaction to your scantily clad Instagram post might fuel your workout, but that mentality quickly fizzles. Unless you are working hard for your own intrinsic motivation, it’s not likely to last, and you won’t necessarily keep it up over the long term.

Uncovering the need for revenge can be even more beneficial in the long run. I always tell my clients, “You can leave your relationship, but you have to take yourself with you.” Many times people think that they can move on with someone else and not have the same issues that caused their last relationship to crumble, but that’s not typically the case.

You can only control yourself, and learning more about who you are, what you want out of life and your relationships, and your contribution to the end of your relationship will give you far more rewards as you move forward than any revenge bod picture ever will.

Hit the gym, take a yoga class, go on a hike, whatever you do, do it because it feels good to you, and nothing else.

If you’re struggling to heal after heartbreak, and would like to learn more about healing in the most positive way, be sure to get on my interest list for The Starting over Series, an e-course I’m developing to help women everywhere heal from heartbreak and become the best version of themselves, so click to sign up below.

What to do when your partner wants out

Your partner has just said the D word, and maybe it’s something that’s been thrown out here and there when tensions get really high, but this time it’s different. Maybe you’ve received official documents of separation or the ante has been upped, and suitcases are being packed. Whatever the case, it doesn’t feel good, and you don’t know what to do, but you know you want it all to stop!

Those feelings of anger, confusion, hurt, and sadness are normal responses, but what do you do when you don’t want to give up? When you want to keep at it, and try something that you haven’t?

The short answer is something that I recently added to my practice, because this is something that I’ve seen often, and before now haven’t necessarily had the right tools in my toolbox for.

Many times couples come in for couple’s therapy and one partner has already got one foot out the door. They’re trying therapy as a last resort, and just to appease their partner and themselves, so in the end they can say they tried everything. Typically couples come in 7 years too late – or at least that’s the statistic I’ve heard thrown around here and there.

In a perfect world everyone would do some premarital counseling, and continue to utilize counseling throughout their relationships when they encounter rough patches. They’d treat their marriages like their cars, and get regular tune-ups. But really, that’s just not the case for many, and I think that statistic exists because the approach to therapy has been wrong.

When one person is out the door it’s difficult to do couple’s therapy. They’ve made up their minds, and their interest level in therapy might no longer be about making improvements. At this point the leaning out partner might just be trying to get their partner to see all the ways they’ve wronged them, and hope that therapy will get them to change. Without each individual seeing their contributions and coming from a place where they are both invested in working together to get back on track, there can be little change.

So the trick is to get them both to that point before jumping into couple’s therapy, and I’ve started doing that with my clients in the form of Discernment Counseling.

Discernment counseling is short term, usually 1-5 sessions, and it’s for what we call, “mixed-agenda couples.” Where one spouse is saying, “I’m done, I want a divorce,” and the other is saying, “No, I want to keep trying.”

In those 1-5 sessions I work with couples to help them understand their contributions, how they arrived at this point where divorce is on the table, and what it will take to choose to enter into couple’s therapy. The goal of Discernment Counseling is to help couples decide between three paths:

Path #1 is to stay the course, and keep doing things the way they’ve been doing them.

Path #2 is the decision to separate or divorce.

Path #3 is a commitment to do 6-months of intense work on the relationship through couple’s therapy. This path isn’t about choosing to stay together forever, but it’s a commitment to take divorce off the table and see what can be accomplished in the next 6 months and then re-evaluate the relationship.

In the meantime, if you are the leaning-in partner, and wanting to make things work, my best advice is to neither pursue nor distance yourself from your partner. Talk to them about the possibility of Discernment Counseling, and take time to think about your contributions to getting to this place in your relationship. It's easy to point the finger at the person who's saying they want out, but it takes two to tango and you need to understand what you need to change in order to move forward. 

Discernment Counseling is something that can be so beneficial because too often couples jump right into couple’s therapy and the timing is off, and both partners are on totally different wave-lengths when it comes to understanding what they really want out of their relationship and need to first decide if they both want to commit to be in the relationship.

While couples come into the office together, they mostly talk with me alone and we meet all together to report out take-aways from the individual time. Couples are coming out of these Discernment sessions with the clarity they need to make the best decisions about the future of their relationship, and I’m happy to be trained in this technique through the Doherty Institute. You can find out more information about the Doherty Institute here.

If you and your partner are at a crossroads in your relationship, and want to find more clarity about what to do next, feel free to give me a call at (909) 226-6124 and I’d be happy to discuss whether Discernment Counseling is right for you and your partner.

Additionally, I want to let you know that if you are in the process of healing after the loss of a relationship, I’m going to be launching an e-course to help those healing from heartbreak called, The Starting over Series. If you’re interested in more info about this course, click the link below and get on the interest list! 

When you just don't feel like it

You know those days when you just don't feel like being inspired by all the wonderful quotes in your newsfeed? The ones that make you just want to hide under the covers with some chocolate and a good Netflix marathon?

Ya, I know those days too, and I recently became a contributor to the Divorcedmom.com website, and that's exactly what I shared about in my first post. I'd love for you to check it out here. Being uninspired while you work through your anger can actually be beneficial, I hope you enjoy the post, and don't forget to leave a comment!