Dear Editor

I became aware of my girlfriend’s cheating just recently. She swears that it was a one-off mistake in a moment of weakness and won’t happen again. She says that she really values our relationship and wants it to work. 

I really want to believe her, but I feel like I can’t trust her anymore. How do we get through this?

Editor’s response

Thank you for your letter reader.

In my years as a therapist and advice columnist, I've seen countless people through the sometimes devastating aftermath of infidelity and the pain and confusion it brings.

No two relationships are alike, and the days and weeks after a betrayal often bring extremely strong emotions that vary by the minute. Sometimes you feel that you are ‘all over the place’ and that you’re going crazy. But you’re not. You’re going through pain and grief and it takes time to recover.

There are so many questions in your mind.  

How many times have they cheated? Is it only once? Do I want to stay in this relationship or not? Will I ever be able to trust again- and would I want to? How on earth did we get here? What made them take our relationship to such a bad place? Surely, it’s more their fault than mine!

These questions will take time to resolve and as you do, more emotions may arise – sadness, despair, guilt, hope, numbness, optimism and so forth.

Why people cheat

You’ll ask yourself a million times why your partner cheated, but there is seldom a simple answer as so many variations could be at play here. Some examples are:

• Is the cheating a symptom of other problems in your relationship? 
• Is there something in your partner’s past? 
• Is communication poor in your relationship that makes them look for sanity elsewhere?  
• Is sex or intimacy a problem?
• Do we have the same values or not?

What the studies say

Whilst your decision should never be guided by research, studies tell us that while the numbers vary depending on the scope and type of survey, it appears that close to half, (or 45 per cent of individuals in monogamous relationships) admit to having an affair. 

Close to 25 per cent of marriages stay together after an instance of cheating, and more men than women stay married when they are the cheating partner (61 per cent vs 44 per cent).*

Death knell or magical marriage? How to recover when someone cheats

I have worked with particularly difficult situations like this and similarly helped couples separate and work out ways forward, particularly if children are involved. 

For many couples, an affair (one-off or regular/ongoing) destroys the relationship for good, leading them to divorce, heartache and much difficulty for their kids as well. 

And getting it right saves the migraines of divorce because of a cheating partner.

Avoiding affairs is vital to the health of any intimate relationship and to the long-term health and stability of family life. 

However, cheating does not always mean the end of a relationship, but it does mean that if a couple wants to stay together, they must both realise that they have a long road ahead (needing lots of commitment) to carve a new relationship moving forward that can be better than it ever was.

If both partners want the relationship to work and are super-committed to turning it around into something magical, they have to follow me as I wave my wand and take them through a process that will demand remorse from the cheating partner, forgiveness, relentless commitment and a healthy dose of effort day in, day out, until you both learn how to have a better relationship.

Moving forward

• Commit to staying together and being brutally honest about your part in the breakdown of the relationship
• Commit to no exit strategy
• Find a good life coach or therapist to help you work through these issues
• With help, work out exactly how the relationship ended up here. Both partners must own their part and what they could have done to improve the relationship before they cheated
• Scrutinise all categories of things that distanced the relationship – the arrival of children, money, in-laws, stress, money pressures and the like
• I go through each category step by step with the couple, helping them design strategies and learning key communication skills to resolve these issues that have built up over time
• Organise date nights and special time together, having learned with your coach how to ‘be’ in your new relationship
• Do a range of exercises and skills training around couple communication and values such as good communication, respect, loyalty and honesty as example
• Little by little the coach will help you build and live in a very different relationship
• The success of this will be up to you and your partner

When a partner cheats, no matter when and for how long, it hurts - like hell. It makes us feel awful and unworthy and devastated by the betrayal.

Cheating will always damage a relationship.  

So, reader, if you choose to stay with your partner, then you can now do so with additional knowledge and an understanding of what to do and how to get help. If you choose not to stay, get a professional to help you separate as well as possible.

Best, Caryn