Okay, so infidelity hit our relationship like a ton of bricks. Honestly, I didn’t know which way was up. Just pure chaos and pain. Felt like everything was shattered. After the initial blow-up, screaming matches, and stony silence, someone – maybe me, maybe a friend, I don’t even remember – mentioned therapy. Couples therapy. My first thought was, “No way, how can talking fix this?” But the alternative, just walking away or living in that misery, felt even worse. So, we decided, very reluctantly, to give it a shot.
Finding Someone and Starting
Finding a therapist felt weird. Like, admitting defeat somehow. We looked online, trying to find someone who dealt with this specific mess. Made a few awkward calls. Finally booked an appointment. Walking into that first session, man, my stomach was in knots. Sitting there, the three of us, felt so forced and unnatural. I didn’t want to talk, didn’t want to look at my partner, didn’t want to look at the therapist.
The Messy Middle Part
Those early sessions were rough. Really rough. Lots of tears, lots of anger. Sometimes we’d just yell. Other times, there’d be this heavy silence that felt like it could suffocate you. The therapist mostly just let us talk, or yell, guiding the conversation sometimes, trying to make sure we weren’t just attacking each other senselessly. It was the first place we could actually say some of the stuff out loud, even the really ugly feelings.
It wasn’t just about me being hurt, either. My partner had to talk about what happened, why they did it. Not making excuses, the therapist was clear about that – you own your actions. But trying to understand the why behind it. That was hard listening. Painful. Made me angry all over again sometimes.
- We had to unpack everything. Not just the affair, but what our relationship was like before.
- Turns out, we weren’t communicating well at all. Lots of resentment built up on both sides.
- We both felt ignored or unappreciated in different ways.
Hearing that stuff wasn’t easy. It’s easier to just blame the cheater, but therapy kind of forced us to look at the whole picture, including my own part in how things got so disconnected. That was a bitter pill to swallow.
Trying to Rebuild Something
The therapist gave us homework sometimes. Sounds silly, but things like actually scheduling time to talk, really talk, without distractions. Trying to listen without interrupting. Trying to express feelings without just blaming. It felt staged at first, really unnatural. Like learning a new language.
There were steps forward and steps back. Good weeks where we felt like maybe we could get through this, followed by bad weeks where old hurts flared up and it felt impossible again. Consistency was key, the therapist said. Keep showing up. Keep trying. We learned, slowly, painfully, to try and see things from the other person’s point of view. Not excusing, but understanding the feelings behind the actions, maybe? Empathy, I guess. It took a long, long time for the raw anger to soften even a little bit.
Where We Are Now
So, did therapy “fix” us? That’s a complicated question. It didn’t magically erase what happened. The trust isn’t just instantly back. But it gave us a space to deal with the explosion and its aftermath in a way we couldn’t have done on our own. It helped us understand the ‘why’ – not just the affair’s why, but the relationship’s why. We learned how to talk to each other again, maybe better than before in some ways.
We’re still together. We decided to try and rebuild. It’s not perfect. Some days are still hard. The scar is always there. But therapy gave us the tools to decide together what we wanted and how to move forward. It wasn’t a magic wand, it was hard freaking work, digging through the wreckage. But for us, showing up and doing that work was the only way through.
