3 Mistakes To Avoid After Confronting Cheating Spouse
You had your suspicions and then you found out for sure that your spouse was cheating. You have confronted your spouse, and now the feelings are hitting you all at once.
You are feeling overwhelming hurt and pain. Your marriage is not what you thought it was. Your spouse lied to you many times about where he/she was, and who he/she was with. Now you are wondering, “is my marriage just a big lie?”
Also, you strongly feel betrayed. You wonder, “how could my spouse be with someone else?” “Especially after I’ve been 100% faithful throughout the relationship!” Perhaps you are feeling angry, or perhaps your spouse is often angry. Anger is often what is shown to the others because often times, anger is the emotion that is easiest to access. For more information on this, view this FREE training helping you to understand the anger.
There are other nagging questions that can’t seem to leave your mind. “Does he/she really love me if he/she cheated on me?” “What makes him/her want to be with someone else after all that we’ve been through together?” “After all I’ve sacrifice, how could he/she do this to me?” “What kind of person cheats on his/her spouse?”
Even though you are asking these questions, you are not sure you can trust his/her answers. After all as the saying goes, “once a cheater, always a cheater.” Even though you are not sure this saying is true, you wonder, “how can we move forward after this?” Also, “how am I supposed to deal with this?”
You ask yourself these questions because, while you want your marriage, you don’t want to be thought of as a fool. The fact is that you are not alone.
The National Institute of Health (NIH) estimates that approximately 25% of marriages experience infidelity, and that infidelity may be more likely to occur in response to pandemic stressors. But the fact that cheating is fairly common does not mean it is less painful.
If your desire is to work on your marriage and make your relationship strong, the following are 3 mistakes you must avoid, when dealing with your spouse's cheating:
Mistake #1 – Avoid Pretending Things Are Now OK
Just because you have confronted your spouse’s cheating, does not mean things are OK. In fact, if the problems are not properly addressed things are likely to get worse. Why is that? Because now that you have confronted your spouse, he/she may be feeling tremendous remorse, guilt, self-disappointment, and/or shame. Unfortunately, when people predominantly feel bad, they tend to make poor choices.
The belief that things are now OK comes from the common misconception that the cheating itself was the problem. But what we know about relationship dynamics is that the cheating is usually a symptom of the problem. If the problem is not addressed, your spouse will continue to respond to you from self-defeating emotions that are likely to lead to bitterness and resentment. Pretending things are OK does not give you the solid relationship you desire.
Mistake #2 – Avoid Trying To Control Your Spouse
Another mistake to avoid is trying to control your spouse. Such actions include: checking his/her phone, reading his/her emails, asking a litany of questions when he/she goes out the house, and following him/her to see if he/she is really going to work, etc. Often this is done out of a belief that if you knew where your spouse was, who he/she was with, what he/she was doing etc., you would be able to protect yourself from getting hurt again. But that is an illusion.
When you try to control your spouse, after a while you become insecure, controlling, resentful, angry and exhausted. And even after trying so hard to control what your spouse does, you eventually realize that you can’t really control another person’s actions. Trying to control your spouse, does not give the relationship security you desire.
Mistake #3 – Avoid Trying To Control The Other Woman/Man
The third mistake you should avoid is trying to control the other woman/man. This includes calling, texting or contacting him/her in person, or on social media.
The most fundamental reason this is a mistake is that when you take time and make efforts to go after the other woman/man, you are taking your focus off your what is really important (your marriage relationship). Also, in going after the other woman/man, you are placing value and importance on someone who really does not have the power to change your relationship for the better. That power lies in the hands of you and your spouse.
Another reason it is a mistake to try controlling the other woman/man is because you can’t. You may spend a lot of time and effort telling the other person what you want him/her to do, but the bottom line is that the other woman/man will end up doing whatever he/she wants to do. Leaving you feeling frustrated, angry and overwhelmed. Trying to control the other woman/man, certainly does not give you the relationship happiness that you desire.
Here’s The Answer – Fix The Intimacy Issues In Your Marriage
Since your marriage belongs to you and your spouse, it is better to spend your time and energy fixing the problems in your relationship. In order to do this, you will need to:
- Find out what are the problems in your relationship and fix them
- Get good at communicating with your spouse, and get the answers to your crucial questions
- Repair the trust that has been broken in the relationship, while building the passion and intimacy in the relationship
If you are ready to fix your relationship problem(s) and have the marriage you desire, check out my online personal development course entitled:
Conflict Resolution – Moving From Isolation To Intimacy. Since the course is online, you can go at your own pace. Also, you can take the course either on your own or with your spouse, and on whatever device you find most convenient.
The course will help you discover the problems in your relationship and guide you to fixing them. It will let you know the right words to say and what to do to improve the communication in your marriage. Finally, the course will teach you how to build the intimacy and passion in your relationship.
If you would like to have a personal, one-on-one online guidance in fixing the problem(s) in your marriage, feel free to contact us at 305-414-1917, or send a message via this contact link.
Conclusion
When cheating occurs in a marriage it causes a lot of hurt, pain and anger. Often, that pain and anger is so overwhelming that you end up making 3 mistakes that further harm your marriage.
Making the mistake of pretending things are OK, trying to control your spouse, or trying to control the other woman/man, results in your feeling frustrated, overwhelmed, resentful and exhausted. Instead, work on finding out the real problem(s) in your marriage, get the answers to your crucial questions, and build the trust and intimacy in your relationship. Our online personal development course will give you the guidance you need to get the solid relationship you desire.