Can Couples Therapy Help After Cheating?
Infidelity can feel like your world is crashing down; like knives stabbing you in the chest; where you can’t sleep or eat. All your comfort and peace ripped away from you. It probably feels impossible that anything can make this pain go away. Anger, betrayal, confusion, sadness. All normal feelings. This is not how you imagined your life progressing. Many couples seek therapy after an incident like this for any hope to prevent the relationship from dying.
The biggest question: why do partners cheat?
First and foremost, understanding why people cheat in relationships does not in any way excuse the behavior. It merely leads to an awareness of the state of the relationship and hopefully a pathway to healing. There are many reasons why a partner might go outside the relationship for a physical or emotional relationship with another person.
Here are some common reasons for infidelity:
Lack of communication. This is almost always at the top of the list. Partners might struggle with openly sharing their feelings and needs in the relationship, and one or both partners might feel unheard or disconnected. After a while, this disconnection becomes lonely and might make someone more susceptible to seek connection outside the relationship. Likewise, unresolved conflicts lead to resentment, and without proper communication and healing, can create the desire to feel understood in another relationship.
Lack of physical intimacy. Many people feel connected when there is physical closeness. If there has been a strain on the sexual relationship for any number of reasons, partners may feel rejected and dismissed. The frustration and loneliness might lead someone to find that physical intimacy outside the partnership.
Emotional neglect. When a partner feels a lack of appreciation, acknowledgment or unseen, seeking outside the relationship might be an attempt to feel valued.
Stress and life transitions: It’s all about the connection and communication between the partners. When there are big life events happening, this can weaken someone’s ability to cope effectively and leave them more vulnerable to get a quick fix to feeling better.
By no means is this an exhaustive list, but it is some of the more common reasons one partner ends up cheating.
How can couples therapy help after infidelity?
Couples therapy will not magically make the pain go away and send you off with a pretty bow on top, unfortunately. The idea is that couples therapy will provide a safe space to process emotions. This can be really powerful for couples who try to have conversations at home and partners feel even more sad, alone, frustrated, unseen, etc. The therapist’s job is to help couples understand what happened in their relationship and how they got to this point. These are tough conversations. Therapy helps both partners practice emotional expression and develop the communication skills to eventually repair the broken connection.
How can couples rebuild after cheating?
Again, this is not a quick process and it is absolutely unfair to expect the hurt partner to feel better quickly. There is no time frame on this kind of pain. The partner who cheated MUST have patience if there is any chance of the relationship moving forward in a healthy way.
Here are a few steps that will start to build trust again:
Absolute transparency. This looks like letting your partner know when you make another stop on the way home, allowing for your phone to be tracked, showing your phone to your partner if they ask, and answering any questions about the affair honestly.
Communicate better. Couples therapy is the place to learn how to communicate your needs and feelings without the threat of the conversation escalating and leaving you feeling unheard. This is where practicing active listening and empathy is vital.
Process the tough emotions. You know what I’m talking about..betrayal, anger, guilt, shame, and fear. Couples therapy is a great place to have a third party help create a supportive and safe environment where partners can feel heard without lashing out or shutting down.
Establish boundaries. Without a doubt, the relationship does change and especially as trust builds again. This can mean negotiating what feels acceptable in the relationship when it comes to phones, spending time with certain people or quality time together.
Be consistent and have patience. I’ve heard the cheating partner say “I’ve been doing everything right for 2 months and it still feels like there is no hope.” Patience. This is a gradual journey and hopefully one worth fighting for. Consistency is important for both partners, not just the cheating partner.
Will the relationship ever be the same again?
Probably not, but that’s a good thing. Even though the circumstances are awful, relationships can become stronger after infidelity if partners are willing to do the work. Couples therapy can help build emotional closeness and greater intimacy, eventually leading to trust. I also want to be clear that not all relationships are destined to stay together and couples therapy can help with closure and clarity.
How therapists handle affairs
It is very important that your couples therapist remains neutral and neither partner feels like the therapist is judging them. The first step is to understand what happened, what went wrong, what patterns exist, what emotions are present and how willing is the partner that cheated to show up for the relationship. In EFT, we work on understanding the pattern or cycle couples get into and the underlying vulnerable emotions that are not being addressed. Our goal is to learn how to turn to our partner and share these attachment needs.
If there is infidelity, I always split partners up for one session to meet with them individually and gather more information without the other partner. Some therapists practice a “no secrets policy” so if there is a secret, like the affair is still going on, the therapist will not hold that secret in the couples dynamic and will encourage the partner to share that in session with their support.
Well?
There is no guarantee that couples therapy can help fix the relationship, but it can be a wonderful guide to help put everything out in the open. For the relationship to be successful, both partners must be willing, open and committed to the change. If your relationship has experienced infidelity and you’d like some guidance in the process of healing, reach out today to schedule a consultation.
