When a woman is faced with the heartache of an infidelity by the man she loves her whole world is completely turned upside down. All that she believes to be true about her relationship is put into question and her future becomes an uncertain one. Infidelity can happen for many reasons but in the majority of cases, infidelity usually occurs due to a pre-existing problem within the relationship that not only needs to be addressed but solved.
It is never acceptable to bring a third person into a relationship, no matter how hard a man tries to justify his actions. If you have established a committed relationship where you have decided to spend the rest of your lives together then that means to the exclusion of all others. No one else should ever enter that union under any circumstance. If you are unhappy in a relationship you have three options - fix the problem areas so you can enjoy the relationship again, do nothing and stay unhappy or break up and start a new life. It's that simple. You don't act dishonourably by cheating, deliberately choosing to deceive people or string people along just so you can have an outlet to feel better. You feel better when you do the right thing.
All couples experience trying times, no one is exempt. Relationships survive when couples have the ‘in it together' mentality but people often forget this when they experience times of discord. Truly loving someone means not just being there for the good times but during the bad times too. This is the ultimate test of love; whether you have the strength and resilience to weather the storms that come your way. It's easy for problems to spiral out of control when you delay rectifying them. You should always eradicate problems the moment they appear otherwise your life could become a very unpleasant one.
A woman is very reluctant to give up on a relationship when she has invested so much of herself into it. When a woman gives her heart to a man he becomes her whole world and it's hard for her to imagine a life without him. This is the reason why women often forgive a man's infidelity because she wants to believe it will never happen again and longs for her life to return to normal. It is extremely difficult for a woman to think clearly when she is so overcome with grief and emotion due to an infidelity. Her heart and head are in conflict; her friends and family all voice their opinions whilst she wishes the whole thing never happened. But the truth is it did and now she is left to deal with the situation the best way she can.
It's hard knowing how to adequately deal with a crisis of this nature when you've never encountered anything like it before. You debate with yourself whether your partner is a bad person or simply a misguided one. Would he have done what he did if the other problems didn't exist? Or, are you seeing a side of his character now which you were blinded to before?
Everyone's situation is different but if you need a bit of extra advise, here are some factors for you to consider.
Firstly, you both need to sit down and talk openly and honestly and decide what you both want. If you still love each other then you owe it to yourselves to fix the relationship and ensure nothing like this ever happens again. If you want out, don't waste each other's time by pretending you are going to work on things when you have no intension to. It's pointless and just prolongs the heartache.
If the man decides to recommit to your relationship he must cease seeing the other woman immediately – that's non-negotiable. There is to be no further contact with her what so ever. It doesn't matter whether he has formed an emotional attachment to her and wants to spare her feelings by letting her down gently. She is the other woman and has no place in your lives. His loyalty must be to you. You are the one he is in the relationship with – not her.
If he keeps making excuses and delays doing the things he has promised, you must not tolerate it. You must refuse to see him or communicate with him until he ends it with the other woman – you must not compromise yourself. He has already pained you enough and it is up to him to make amends and repair the damage he has caused.
Understand that spending too much time apart in a relationship can be quite dangerous. Sometimes it is necessary to get away for a few days to gather your thoughts, recharge your batteries and determine what you want from life but don't allow that time apart to become excessive. Communication breakdowns often occur when messages become misconstrued when they are delivered down a telephone line or via email. You should always communicate face to face.
If you do break-up and are fortunate enough to find your way back to each other perhaps 6 or 12 months later, that's great. But you must keep in mind that whatever happens during that time apart, while you were free entities, you have no right to make any claims on each other's behaviour. What matters is what you do when you are together. Quite often all the things that do transpire during a break-up period only happen because a person is emotionally responding to the break-up itself.
If the relationship does come to an end and you have done absolutely everything you could to save it, don't beat yourself up about it. He is the one who failed, not you. You did your upmost best and he is the fool who let you go. Once he is gone you will most probably experience some of the darkest days of your life. It's common for women to experience depression, suffer from weight and even hair loss from the stress and anguish he has caused. Sometimes it can take up to two years before you start to recover from a broken heart and all the trauma associated with it.
If you have trouble coping and a lot of women do, you must find a way to shift your focus. Change your environment, move home if you need to, and eliminate reminders of him from your life. Form new social groups; take up new hobbies, do whatever it takes to distract your thoughts away from him. You will probably go through a period where you just want to isolate yourself and keep your family and friends at arm's length because you don't want them to see how much pain you're in but you need to be socially connected to people. Bottling emotions is not healthy, you need to talk to people and get things out of your system. It does help.
And if you've exhausted all options and nothing seems to make you feel any better, try going back to the point in your life of where you were before you met him and pretend he never existed.