Article About Affairs

[shes2smart]

Thought this was an interesting Q&A article with a counselor who has written a book. It's his opinion that an affair doesn't have to signal the end of a relationship. He bases this on his work counseling couples dealing with infidelity.

 

 

An affair can be the beginning of a better marriage.

 

Upper Arlington psychologist Stephen M. Judah will deliver that shocking message to a national TV audience today when he discusses his new book, Staying Together When an Affair Pulls You Apart (Inter-Varsity, $14.95), on the ABC talk show The View. Judah, a specialist in relationship counseling, has much more to say about marriage and infidelity.

 

Rest of the article is here:

 

link removed

[nikkers04]

Great article...THANKS

[Ash]

I've heard and read that before in several places. It seems there are many sources of advice that claim a marriage is retrievable after (or during) an affair. It does happen that way, and considering the number of secret affairs as well, many marriages survive them. I know of cases where the affair lasted for over two decades!

 

Keeping this in mind, it makes it doubly important that those of use giving advice on here don't dismiss a marriage based on infidelity. We're here for support and to convey personal experiences, not always just to advise people to exit all but the most noble of relationships.

 

Thanks for the not very often conveyed counterpoint 'smart!

[tylercdurden2004]

In some cases it may very well be the point at which the persons involved realize what they have and what they want. Kind of a shake up if you will.

 

On the other hand there could be a conflict of interest considering councellors get paid for this type of issue so how many relationships can come back from the brink is debatable.

[Oldboy]

Put me down for a "Don't know"

[shes2smart]

Before I got married, I woulda said cheating was a deal breaker 100% of the time, no question about it.

 

My one experience being cheated on happened when I was pretty much done with the relationship (not marriage). That was just the last straw. But if that hadn't happened, I was fixin' to leave anyway...catching him cheating just sped it up by a few weeks...maybe a month.

 

Now that I've been married for 4 years, I started thinking about what I might do if I found myself in that situation again after reading this article.

 

It's harder to break-up when you're married...it's not just a matter of getting your own apartment, packing your things and leaving anymore. You have to go through the whole legal process of getting a divorce and you're more likely to have a lot of shared financial crap (house, car loans, retirement accounts, etc.) than if you were shacked up with someone or just dating someone.

 

I was also pondering if I might behave differently if the relationship overall was good and I still wanted to be in it (minus the infidelity)....and not like my cheating ex, when I was 90% out the door anyway.

 

Maybe I'd end up leaving anyway...but I do know that I'd find it a lot harder to leave a marriage in both an emotional and practical sense than it was when I ended previous relationships with bfs.

 

Let's keep our fingers crossed and hope I don't ever have to find out, though.