Whether or not you’re in a relationship, you can learn valuable lessons from an affair: the politics of betrayal is often a deeper comment on the roles we play when in a relationship; it also highlights distresses created by silence, dominance, lies and double standards, and teaches us about the deep-seated constructs on which we build our relationships and the very trust we place in love.

An affair is a person and a relationship in crisis. No matter what we call it (“affair”, “indiscretion”, “fling”) or how short it was (“just once”, “nothing serious”, “just a kiss”), an affair is loaded with layers of betrayal.

There are many ways to break someone’s trust, but having an affair often seems to be – for those who are not living in an open relationship and for whom having multiple partners is not a concerted choice – one of the ultimate betrayals.

When one partner crosses an intimate limit, and tries to hide it, the building blocks of the relationship are shifted— not only trust and respect, but also the desirability and attraction someone has towards their partner. The betrayed partner is left with a sense of loss and confusion: How could someone who is supposed to love them break the very base of the relationship?

Listening to the many impacts an affair can have on people is a story I’m confronted with almost daily as a clinical therapist. Everyone will deal with betrayal in their own way, but here are few valuable life lessons I noted following years of sessions with couples:

The way we choose to recover from the breaks in trust caused by an affair will often reflect how we’ve coped with difficult situations in the past. If our relationship has not been confronting obvious issues, dealing with an affair’s consequences can require a new set of relationship skills.

Old ways of avoiding talking openly about issues might need a change to deal with what often is a painful and complicated experience. Couples who are willing to do the work learn new ways of engaging with each other that might benefit their relationship. In other words, a break in trust forces a new form of speaking and communicating.

If someone’s old pattern was about shifting blame to get what they wanted and avoid responsibility, trying to go through a betrayal could feel like a power struggle where a type of scorecard is kept on who’s done what. This blame game doesn’t deepen an understanding of each other’s different experiences, and is often not a road to recovery.

Distracting attention away from what has been done, pointing fingers, becoming the victim in someone’s own damaging story and getting angry (as if this was done to the person who cheated) are well-known tricks of manipulation. Instead, both partners’ energy should be focused on speaking the truth and taking responsibility for what has been done. It can be tough to live responsibly, but it brings relief and peace of mind in time.

We can never sweep a betrayal under the carpet. We can try, but usually, if we ignore the issue and move on as if nothing happened, it will be more difficult to recover. Betrayed partners continue to live in anxiety and uncertainty, and the risk of the issue resurfacing later in the relationship is great. Being caught out is an opportunity to speak the truth and make a change, rather than continuing to hide things between each other; healthy relationships are not built on lies.

In therapy practice, I often connect with how damaging it is to a partner who hides things from their significant other. Hiding or keeping secrets is frequently at the core of most abusive experiences, such as women and child abuse.

Speaking your truth in your most important relationships has a powerful energy. It’s not always a comfortable journey to build your relationship on honesty, but it gives both partners a sense of being alive and at peace that hiding cannot give.

In addition, cheating or breaking an agreement can sometimes be a form of commentary on our relationship. It tells us something about our relationship that we might find difficult to hear. A break in the trust is an opportunity to learn, and directs both partners towards a need that has not been met in the relationship for a long time.

It can also say a lot more about the person who’s broken the trust than it does about the relationship. It may be that one partner is showing a part of themselves that the other one might be struggling to see. In other words, one partner can feel very satisfied with their choice in partner, but made the decision to have an affair based on ego, insecurity — the other side of ego — and opportunity. As much as we will inevitably internalise the betrayal, looking at who our partner really is, is crucial to moving forward.

Knowing the details of the betrayal seems essential to start the healing process, although this is not about knowing every little detail. Instead, it’s about having the opportunity to ask the questions we need to ask to heal, and getting what feels like honest answers.

If you’ve betrayed your partner, your honesty and your willingness to answer their questions about your betrayal are your first contributions to restoring trust. In other words, how you participate in the process from the start will show signs of trust being restored as a comment on your commitment.

The process of asking questions and getting honest answers is one of the most essential methods on the road to recovery and healing, but being on the receiving end of a break in trust does not give licence to treat the other partner badly. Speaking to a partner in damaging ways creates a second layer of betrayal and often makes the situation worse.

To recover from the betrayal of an affair, both partners need to do work on themselves and the relationship. Even if you’re not in any way responsible for the betrayal, you’ll need to participate and make changes to recover fully. This can be hard when angry and hurt, but at some point, looking beyond emotions and reasons, and actively participating in the process of recovery is fundamental.

While conducting couples therapy, I am often reminded that we’re born into social ideas of how men and women should behave and that they have a more significant influence than we’d like to acknowledge. We cannot blame ourselves for the problem caused in our relationships through these powerful gender roles, but we can make changes and grow.

Stories shared by our fathers and mothers, and what they represent to us, is often at the heart of the problem caused by an affair. Looking beyond the immediate problem and going into a deeper understanding of the gender discourses our parents may have handed down to us and that shape our behaviour is an important step to moving forward.

Behind every problem is a person. We can get caught up in a problem-saturated story and forget who we’re in a relationship with and why we made a commitment. Without excusing the problems, it’s important to look at our partner (or the problem) with kindness and compassion; speak to each other with love in order to remain hopeful and avoid referring to the relationship as problematic — instead, the focus should be on working together to restore a sense of safety.

We are multi-dimensional beings: the parts that define our identity can often move in opposite directions. As much as you can lie, you can also be honest. You can be dark and light, soft and hard. Are we ever just one thing? Be careful not to generalise the break in trust through absolute, generalised statements. Your observation of each other and your relationship should speak of knowing your partner’s many sides, and attempting to get to know the problem.

Stories about losses and past hurts, as well as not being enough, or being rejected, abandoned, broken and scared, all create vulnerability and fear. Speaking about our fears and showing our vulnerabilities are essential parts of the healing process. ML

Stefan Blom is a clinical psychologist who specialises in relationships. He lives and works in Cape Town and is the author of The Truth About Relationships (translated into Afrikaans and Romanian) published by Human & Rousseau.

http://blom.studio/relationships

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