what about respect?

[NW Homey]

All I ever really see or hear anyone talk about after an afair is the trust issue. Does anyone else have any thoughts on respect after an affair?

[Invicta]

The trust is gone after an affair...

 

Respect can be regained because the things you admire about a person usually have nothing to do with the affair.

 

The question is wether or not the positive aspects of the person you love are greater than the terrible insult and pain caused by an affair.

[itsallgrand]

It can be difficult to respect someone after an affair. Their integrity flies out the door. Personally, I struggle with that. Always feeling that drop of respect now.

What sort of ethical character you respect may have a large part to do with it.

Values. Morals. Character. If the person has 'lied' about the type of person they are or not.

 

For example: I'd think for a preacher's wife to hear of her hubby's affair would influence her respect for him drastically.

The stripper who falls in love and hears of her wild bf's affair, respect would drop....maybe not so much of an issue for her?

[yeawutever]

Yea, both trust and respect is lost after an affair.

[RayKay]

All I ever really see or hear anyone talk about after an afair is the trust issue. Does anyone else have any thoughts on respect after an affair?

 

Well, part of the reason I have my "no tolerance" personal rule for cheating is because I want to preserve the respect for MYSELF.

 

And for those whom say you don't know until you have been there, I sure have been there! Both personally in my own relationships, and due to experience as a child of parents where one was having an affair (my dad - he and my mum ended up splitting up).

 

Trust is greatly damaged, and I would say respect is correlated greatly to that as well. If I can't trust someone, I don't see how I would respect them personally. I certainly would not respect them for disrespecting me and the relationship.

 

Some couples do rebuild. Great for them. It takes a lot of work and pain to do that. I also see a lot of one-sided "rebuilds" where the cheating happens again and again though too. For me, it is something I just have to walk away from. And I realize it is harder if there are kids involved and so on, but after seeing what my mum went through and knowing that I as a kid knew what was going on, I STILL think I would walk away from a cheating partner.

[nottoogreen]

All I ever really see or hear anyone talk about after an afair is the trust issue. Does anyone else have any thoughts on respect after an affair?

 

OK, lets talk about the respect issue.

 

On hindsight, having been cheated on too, I think there were "respect" problems in the relationship.

 

My 2nd wife who cheated on me as a sport and even made a kid with a fling I signed for told me often (much earlier) that I would not respect her.

 

In mitigation, she was 10 years younger and Filipina and I was much too tough and busy anyway (running business in China, Middle east, up to 80 planes per year) and did not trust here over lies about money theft instigated by her hungry and big family.

 

Hindsight makes smarter.

 

In short before the cheating there are other issues and likely lack of respect.

 

After, there is almost nothing - we still had good sex, she was she horniest woman of my life being able to have a full orgasm while going down one me and without me touching her.

[theantibarbie23]

Nevermind the cheater, I honestly think I would no longer be able to respect myself if I took back someone who had an affair.

[NW Homey]

What I've been finding for myself is that when yo have been cheated on, respect is about on equal footing with trust. In fact sometimes I feel like it has more to it. There are people out there (anywhere) that I could trust but I have no respect for them. Since I have been cheated on I don't think I can trust my wife and I really lost alot of respect for her. Without respect it is hard to even conceive of her gaining my trust back. This was her second time in 20 years and has done me in this time. But my point here is that even if I trusted her I wouldn't respect her. Both are bad relationship busters. The combination is devastating.

[nottoogreen]

What I've been finding for myself is that when yo have been cheated on, respect is about on equal footing with trust. In fact sometimes I feel like it has more to it. There are people out there (anywhere) that I could trust but I have no respect for them. Since I have been cheated on I don't think I can trust my wife and I really lost alot of respect for her. Without respect it is hard to even conceive of her gaining my trust back. This was her second time in 20 years and has done me in this time. But my point here is that even if I trusted her I wouldn't respect her. Both are bad relationship busters. The combination is devastating.

 

I appreciate your lack of respect after. No need to go back!

 

My original reply was about lack of respect before, to understand what went wrong.

[Hope75]

I think that in order to trust someone fully, you have to be able to respect them. So, they do in fact go hand in hand.

[jchan]

Trust and Respect, they correlate at times and they can be two different things. Depending on the context that it's used.

 

If you respect someone enough, they have earned your trust throught that respect.

 

or if you trust someone enough, you earn their respect due to the fact you can trust their qualities and actions.

 

In terms of differences It is also true that you can trust a person but not respect them e.g. a very shady friend who treats you well

 

or you can respect them but not trust them e.g. a mafia leader