How To Confront An Affair

Being lied to is one of the most damaging things two people can do to each other in any type of a relationship. Lying to someone you love significantly reduces the trust in your relationship, the respect you have for one other and places the relationship itself in serious jeopardy. What makes lying even worse is when it involves the most personal aspects of our lives; our intimate relationships. Lying is difficult enough on its own to tolerate in a relationship but when lying is used as an instrument to aid in a cover up of clandestine actions such as cheating, it only further deepens the pain inflicted on a personal relationship.

In the beginning, a person who is cheated on begins to notice a few things in their relationship that are very different then they are accustomed to. Their perceptions of the relationship have them noticing a few signs that illicit concerns about their partner's behavior. They often initially feel their partner pulling away from them or often just feel that something is not right. Originally an individual may have thought these feelings were just another phase in the relationship where other priorities just seemed to come first between them and their significant other.

But then they began noticing several things that do not add up, possibly caught their partner in a few lies, and went to some extreme measures to have their partner monitored. As they kept a watchful eye on their partner they hoped that they were just being insecure, jealous, possibly overreacting, but often learn they were in denial with what was actually happening with their partner. As time went by they began doing a little checking on finances, snooping, monitoring phone calls, they realize that they have stumbled across their partner having an affair.

Some people are in such a state of denial that they fail to believe that their partner is cheating and so they do not address the possibility that they are being cheated on by their partner. After all, affairs happen to other couples who are always fighting, and their unhappy relationships are often well known. Like anything else in a relationship the ability to communicate with your partner is very important and this includes confronting your significant other on your beliefs that they are cheating on you and getting the results that you are looking for from your significant other.

So how does a person confront their partner about their suspicions of infidelity? It is difficult to just sit by with information that your partner is treating you like a piece of filth, therefore many people immediately confront their significant other with little evidence or planning for tactfulness on addressing the situation properly.

I compare confronting a cheating partner like presenting a case to a judge or jury. You have to make sure that you have very concrete evidence, would be able to convince someone who is not emotionally involved in the situation that you are accurate in your assumptions and that your partner will most likely reveal the truth after you have presented them with everything that you know. Make sure that you have all the evidence with you before you confront your partner and can show them what you know if needed. Be prepared before the confrontation. If your partner has an opportunity, they will attempt to retrace their steps, cover up mistakes, or learn from their mistakes. This is why you must be prepared before the confrontation. If you make allegations against your partner that are more spontaneous or rudimentary you are apt to make yourself feel stupid when you are unable to counter your significant others responses or improvised excuses. Be prepared for answers you fear, their expected excuses, their statements and behaviors of avoidance. Keep a very watchful eye on your significant other's body language and what your partner does not say as well as what they do say.

After doing a lot of thinking and have come to terms with the reality of the affair it is time to question your significant other and get answers. If you are lucky you have plenty of evidence that your partner has been cheating, you are not willing to accept any more excuses or poor explanations, and are going to be very clear on your expectations. Before moving forward make sure your evidence is undeniable with little wiggle room for excuses, no plausible deniability, or room for further lies. Accusing your partner of cheating because you found a Coke Can in their car when they usually drink Pepsi is hardly reason for cheating accusations. Making false accusation will bring massive dissensions into your relationship, cause a breech in trust, and make your partner pull away from you even more. What I am getting at is make sure your partner is having an affair before you begin accusing them of cheating.
If you are sure your partner is cheating you must begin to start asking some pretty straight forward questions before you approach your partner. Do you actually feel you are ready to address the fact that your significant other is cheating on you? Even though you are absolutely sure your significant other is cheating will you be able to sit in the same room with them if after you accuse them of cheating they come clean and begin describing the details of the affair. Are you prepared for your partner to tell you that they are in love with someone else? Having your suspicions, looking at the evidence, following your instincts and having insight into your partner behavioral patterns is a lot different than watching your partner tell you that they have been sleeping with a friend of yours every Thursday when they told you they were working late. It is important that you are actually prepared for the answers you are seeking even though you will be extremely uncomfortable.
Have some ground rules in your mind before confronting your partner. If the affair is admitted to what are you prepared to do? What if your partner blows you off and refuses to listen? What if your partner storms out of the house stating "I cannot do this now." Are you prepared to leave or ask your partner to leave if sharing an apartment or home? Have some idea as an end result of discussing the affair. If you are unsure of what you are going to do, take some time and be prepared to make some major decisions or even call a partners bluff. Most individuals are unwilling to admit to an affair without evidence. You are not likely to get the truth from your partner and you have to ask yourself what you are trying to get from the confrontation.

The very first thing you need to do in the confrontation process is to provide safety for all those involved. Make sure your environment is safe. When you confront someone in a serious relationship with allegations of infidelity, emotions are going to run very high. The first assessment you need to acknowledge before confronting your significant other is assess whether or not they are prone to physical, emotional, or verbal abuse. If the answers to any of these questions are yes, I would suggest having a close friend, family members, or a counselor to assist you with the confrontation. The last thing you need in this situation are police officers at your home intervening in a domestic dispute.

Once you think that you have a well-rounded plan, have enough evidence to prove your beliefs of an affair, and are ready to confront your partner, make sure that you are functional and level headed enough to follow through with your plan. You do not want to sit with your partner thinking about the plan you have developed in confronting them only to completely lose the ability to rationally have a discussion. There is no point in sitting down with your partner if all you can think about is fantasizing how that statue you just received from your partner would look embedded in the back of their cranium.
When confronting your partner try your best to remain composed as you begin to ask some very difficult questions. The entire purpose of this confrontation is to get answers, validate your suspicions, and make some crucial decisions about your relationship. This will never happen if there is only yelling, screaming, and dodging any object that you can get your hands on while in the presence of your partner. Do not begin the conversation with expletives describing the affair partner, your significant others actions, or making any personal threats. Begin the conversation by stating your concerns and offer your partner the opportunity to honestly admit to the affair. In most cases a cheating partner is not going to come clean without ample evidence so anticipate resistance and denial in the beginning stages of the confrontation.
If significant other comes clean and admits to the affair, your partner deserves a little credence for not dragging this dilemma out. The majority of the situations involving confrontations of affairs involve an accused partner rolling their eyes in an animated fashion which usually progresses into your partner reverting to your confrontation as an extreme exaggeration. Your partner will accuse you of jealousy, having personal issues, being insecure, among many other things. When the character assassinations begin it is often a sign of defensiveness and often a last ditch effort to attempt to block your insinuations. This is about your significant other's behavior and not yours. Do not allow them to make this about you. If they seem too defensive ask them why so much emotional outrage about your concerns? If you are incorrect there should not be too much frustration and acrimony.
While discussing your partner's infidelity, do not drag anyone else into your confrontation unless you have to as stated above for physical safety concerns. If someone else found out about your cheating partner do not divulge their name as this will create a rift between your partner, the source, and perhaps the source and yourself later on. Also it is a good idea to keep all information close to yourself so that your partner is unaware of whom they should avoid or not confide in. If your partner knows the whereabouts of your source they can avoid it in the future. Do not invite friends or family to give their opinions or seek some sort of intervention in the form of a group session with your cheating partner. The fewer people who know about the affair the better. You will have a life after these events. You may have the ability to forgive your partner for their infidelity at some point, but friends and family may not be as forgiving. This is ultimately a decision that you will have to make on your own. If you seek opinions and advice from friends and family do not use their names as sources in the confrontation.

If you have children, get them to babysitters, grandparents, or a friend's house. Older children have the ability to understand what is taking place; smaller children will wonder what is taking place between partners and could get scared or worried. Discussions that involve infidelity can take hours with periods of extreme emotional outbursts, moments of emotional breakdowns, incidence of compassion, and have repeated episodes of each through the entire confrontation. It is not a proper place to expose children to.

Try your best to listen to your partner without interrupting, or becoming too emotional. Do your best to just try and communicate effectively. This means there is a speaker and a listener. You will never fully get to the bottom of the affair and all of its details if you cannot listen to what each of you are saying. If you feel the confrontation and discussion is getting too heated, take a break and agree to come back and discuss the situation in a few minutes or a bit later. Get your partner to understand that you want answers and this discussion is not just going to go away.

Even though your partner had an affair and this is obviously a very serious blow to your relationship but do not assume the worst. Many relationships suffer the impact of infidelity and are able to manage to stay together and weather the storm that you are treading through right now. Many couples report feeling a renewed bond between each other that actually made their relationship stronger after recovering from an affair. The relationship does not have to end immediately after the confrontation. There is no reason to immediately begin looking for an apartment, begin packing, calling a divorce lawyer, etc. Monitor the response of your partner in the next few weeks and months after the confrontation if you are interested in salvaging the relationship. Do you feel as though they are working with you on the relationship? Are they beginning to gravitate back to you emotionally? Is there something in the relationship worth staying for? There are several decisions that will have to be made in the near future but do not rush into anything too soon.

In the meantime, give each other space and check in with each other routinely if you decide to stay together. The road back to a healthy relationship after infidelity is long and very uncomfortable. Rebuilding trust and intimacy takes a lot of time to rebuild and is filled with many ups and downs. Just when you think the mental images of the affair are gone from your mind they resurface and the painful moments are reborn again. Be there for your partner whenever they have questions regarding the affair and be completely honest about what your significant other asks. Do not make any major decisions in your life for several months if at all possible. Make some healthy decisions for yourself in the meantime. Avoid concealing your low self-esteem with revenge affairs, alcohol, drugs, or other self-destructive behaviors. Get support from your friends and family to help you through this difficult process. If you need to get individual counseling to help with your feelings involving the betrayal seek it out. If you want to address the affair and think a mediator would work for you, try marriage counseling. You and your significant other should both get checked for sexually transmitted infections after the affair. Look into other areas of your life before committing completely to your partner again if you decide to do so. A person who has the ability to deceive you in such a personal manner may be taking advantage of you in other ways as well. The mantra for the rest of your relationship will be trust through verification. 

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