Infidelity

Can I ever trust you again? Will you ever forgive me? Can we heal and recover our love?  I help couples address these questions and deal with the challenges when a partner has been unfaithful. Where appropriate, I assist couples in deciding whether to recommit or end their relationship.

I offer practical guidance and a roadmap to help couples recover and rebuild trust and intimacy after an affair.  This often includes suggested reading–such as Janis Abrahms Spring, Ph.D.’s excellent book, After the Affair. To build security and establish appropriate boundaries to protect your relationship from infidelity, we would explore specific strategies that promote behavior change and trust.

Recovery from an affair and prevention of future affairs involves examining the boundaries that are needed to protect a relationship. I help couples to examine what Shirley Glass, in her book Not Just Friends, describes as the walls and windows needed in a relationship–walls that shield the relationship from outside forces that could be a threat; windows of honesty and openness that keep you connected within your relationship. Infidelity can result when there is some degree of reversal of effective walls and windows–a wall of secrecy erodes the intimacy within the relationship and a window of intimacy opens with another person. I help couples recover from infidelity–and prevent future affairs–by establishing effective walls, windows and boundaries in their relationship.

Whatever your goals are, we are likely to focus on understanding the meaning of the affair and accepting appropriate responsibility, engaging in a gradual healing process in which you talk about the range of feelings and pain you are experiencing , and exploring issues of trust, intimacy, possible forgiveness or acceptance.  If you have decided to work on recovery, you would be working together to build a foundation of trust and a new relationship.