Five Steps to Rebuilding your Relationship after an Infidelity

An SMS discovered by chance on a laptop, an email you wouldn’t have read then all of a sudden, everything changes. He has a mistress, she has a lover. The discovery of an extramarital relationship throws the couple into turmoil. Some do get up and separate, others manage to cross the storm and try to rebuild their relationship.

Each infidelity situation is unique and it is impossible to offer infallible recipes that would guarantee a harmonious restoration of the couple. Nevertheless, there are useful keys that can help to rebuild the broken spots caused by a betrayal. This can only be successful if the couple is bent on restoring their relationship.

Let’s see five steps to rebuilding the love and confidence between spouses especially after an infidelity.

Understand what happened

According to Winston Churchill “Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it”. Attempting to understand why and how the extra marital relationship was established is an essential first step. Ask yourself questions like; what attitudes, negligence, illusions, disappointments on one side or the other led your partner into cheating? Majority of couples interviewed said that their spouse was a major reason for their infidelity.

Extramarital relationship does not necessarily signify a loss of the bond of love. While you are still in love with your spouse, there are indeed personal circumstances that make it impossible to find in one’s partner the answers one seeks. Doubts, insecurities, periods of unemployment, bereavement or personal difficulties can make a loving spouse to cheat.

Restore communication

During the first exchanges, it is important to get out of the mystery surrounding the extramarital relationship because your imagination could create scenarios that are always worse than reality. The unfaithful spouse would have to evaluate what he / she wants to reveal. Who is this person you slept with? Where and in what circumstances did you meet him?

In the quest for answers, the deceived person must be careful, especially while addressing the details of a sexual nature. Too many details can indeed hurt and apart from the sexual details, we see that the deceived person often needs this type of conversation, not for self-flogging but to appropriate the missing elements thus allowing him to put everything “end to end”.

Beyond the concrete facts, there is a second level of communication, where one deals with the fundamental questions on the deep reasons for the infidelity and ascertains the state of mind of the unfaithful spouse. Does she still have feelings for her lover? Is he remorseful? If you want to move forward as a couple, then some questions and details about the infidelity should be ignored.

Accept to forgive:

Forgiveness is an important tool for rebuilding the relationship after an infidelity. To forgive is not to forget that your spouse betrayed you but to say; “I’m fully aware that you’ve hurt me and I’ve the right to revenge but I’ve decided to overlook what happened. I have decided to walk away from the anger, resentment, grief and bitterness so I can be happy again.”

Restore trust:

Restoring trust after an infidelity might seem impossible. To make it easier, there should be an honest and sincere dialogue on the extramarital relationship. Also, the spouse who cheated must renounce the relationship with the other person.

After renouncing the relationship, the deceived partner might assume that her spouse could still have feelings from the affair. This can weaken the trust she is trying to rebuild.

Sometimes, it is impossible to put the other person at a distance especially when it is a neighbor, a co-worker or someone close. This is because fortuitous encounters may occur, especially at working premises. The thoughts of this possibility can make your spouse feel unsecured as she might feel you would fall into another romance with the individual.

What should be done in such case? You can limit your interaction with the individual to strictly official.  You can also share with your spouse your daily encounter with the individual. These help in building trust points.

Restore the Intimacy:

After an infidelity discovery, the couple might find it difficult to kick start their sexual activities. While the unfaithful spouse withdraws due to shame and guilt, the other spouse withdraws due to anger and bitterness.

This attitude shouldn’t be allowed for long as it could create an emotional gap which in turn results to another infidelity.  In the process of rebuilding, it is expected that the couple discuss how to restore their sexual desires for one another.

Moreover, some couples do not succeed on their own and would need the help of a professional sexologist to reactivate the desire. Very often, sexual intimacy closely follows the return of emotional intimacy, which is directly related to the feeling of security, so the return of sexuality goes hand in hand with the restoration of trust.

After the infidelity, the main challenge is to restore the emotional intimacy. In reality, this intimacy is in two forms namely; intimacy with spouse and intimacy with oneself. Both must be tackled head-on, otherwise the rebuilding of the relationship remains partial and fragile.