Surviving Infidelity: Different Types of Affairs
Posted: Friday, April 10, 2009
by Katie Recknagel
Surviving an affair starts as soon as a person realizes his/her spouse is having an affair. For most of us, the pain and confusion, numbness and anger of the realization is compounded by myths and half-truths about infidelity that make overcoming the affair that much more difficult. Coping with infidelity initially demands confronting one's taught beliefs about infidelity and extramarital affairs. What are they?
One other false belief is that the cheating spouse jumped into the arms of the other person because the marriage was so awful. Quite often, this means that the sex was awful, or even nonexistent. And so, the cupboard of marriage was bare of sex and/or intimacy and the cheating spouse just "had" to get his/her needs met... somewhere else, of course. The wounded spouse, in his or her endeavors to deal with the affair, is thus confronted with his or her sexual (in)adequacy - his or her lack of being able to meet the needs of his or her spouse. Additionally, and often without major dialogue, this finds him or her forsaken, alone, and incredibly jealous of the other person (OP) how is now getting all of the goodies.
The 7-year itch. Ever heard of it? It may be an excuse to wonder and wander. To cope with infidelity the wounded spouse is often blind-sided by the impulsivity of his/her spouse and is left home, coping with infidelity by trying to hold his/her world together in the midst of the chaos. And, last but not least, there is the rationalization of (in)compatibility. The couple was simply not compatible. Or, the cheating spouse, in a moment of insight, came to the conclusion of their incompatibility and needed to find his/her "soul mate" or someone with whom s/he felt compatible. The wounded spouse is left bemoaning the differences he or she might have had with his or her spouse as if those differences tainted the entire relationship. Coping with infidelity and moving toward healing and recovery is enhanced by breaking down these myths and half-truths, and learning about the complexity, patterns and themes of infidelity and extramarital affairs. Knowledge about infidelity becomes power. Knowledge about infidelity brings great
relief, quite often right then and there. Knowledge about infidelity gives options to act, feel and think differently, which gives one a tremendous feeling of personal power.
The "wounded spouse" moves out of the victim role, and now knows the affair is not his/her fault. S/he is not defective. She or he can confront him or her with a basic educated guess as to the end result of that confrontation. Each affair is unique. Each type of affair serves a different purpose to the cheating husband or cheating wife. Here are the points of knowledge that, once learned, will bring about a tremendous
amount of hope and relief.
1. There are different types of infidelity. My research came up with 7 types of affairs. (My Marriage Made Me Do It, I Can't Say No, I Don't Want to Say No, I Fell Out of Love...and just love being in love, I Want to Get Back at Him/Her, I Need to Prove my Desirability, and I Want to be Close to Someone...but can't stand Intimacy.
2. The reasons behind the varying types of affairs are distinctive. One may be motivated by compulsion, another by strong personal needs for excitement, another for revenge, another to maintain distance in all relationships, and another to project blame onto someone or something else.
3. These motives derive not from the marital relationship or the wounded spouse, but from the personal coping patterns of the cheating spouse. Additionally, these characteristics, motives, and patterns were already set well before the marital couple even met. The cheating spouse, at some level, needed to "play out" these patterns. Unsurprisingly, most of this acting out (if not all of it), or at least the motivation behind the acting out, are well outside the consciousness of the cheating wife or husband.
Once the wounded spouse becomes aware of these patterns, the complexity of the infidelity and the motives for the cheating spouse - and other person as well - a flood of relief flows. The more one can make distinctions in a situation, the more refined those distinctions become, the less power that situation has to control the feelings and behavior of a person. Knowledge is power because it now gives options.
The wounded spouse is not suspended in time. The wounded spouse is NOT helpless. The wounded spouse is definitely not less than the cheating spouse and not any less than the other person. Now, the wounded spouse can actually step back, and on some level even appreciate the anguish, the disjointed striving, and the veiled inner indecision of his/her spouse. And now the wounded spouse can overcome infidelity in powerful ways, registering actions and words that disrupt this hugely destructive pattern and give hope for resolution.
I am dedicated and passionate about educating and helping people face the infidelity crisis in their marriage or relationship. My goal is to help couples as well as infividuals cope with the unique extramarital affair facing them. I provide useful articles to help identify types of affairs and plan different tactics to stop the infidelity or extramarital affair quickly and help heal the pain and agony in order to survive the affair. surviving infidelity and how to survive an affair
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Top-level comments on this article: (1 total)The sad and unacceptable truth is that it IS more than possible to be in love with more than one person at the same time.Sin, guilt, counselling, betrayal, shame and divorce is culturally taught and need not be injected into the equation.One cannot control one's heart and the struggle is with accepted norms, often.Many people have open marriages for the self same reason; to avoid asking their consciences to sit in the corner like a well trained German Sheppard.Monogamy was never inherent in Biblical times, and many cultures around the world today accept other wives and paramours as more than natural.This freedom to love has unfortunately never been granted to women and wives as men believe that they must rule the roost.Pain and grief, betrayal and rejection need not overwhelmingly prevail in a marriage where an affair is discovered as the heart's truth is down a long hall and somewhere else.
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