When They Deny the Affair

Posted on by stilllearning2b

Something’s up. Maybe you stumbled across an inappropriate text or perhaps there’s just a different energy in the air. Either way, your suspicions are growing, eating at you as your imagination begins to shift into overdrive.

Summoning your courage as you straddle the line between wanting to know and wanting to believe that everything is okay, you ask –

“Are you having an affair?”

And the response is volleyed back.

“No.”

You’re not sure how to feel. It’s the answer you want to hear. Want to believe. But at the same time, you’re not sure if you do believe it.

In some ways, you’d prefer a confirmation of your fears, because then at least you would know where you stand.

But this?

It’s maddening.

Agonizing.

Obviously someone isn’t telling the truth. But is it your partner or your own fears?

As you try to unravel the truth, begin by considering the reasons they may be denying an affair –

They may be trying to have their cake and eat it too.

“But I want them both!” you can just picture this person insisting like a spoiled toddler while stomping their feet. This is the stereotypical selfish cheater. They want what they want and they don’t expend too much energy thinking about how it might impact those around them. They lie not because they particularly enjoy lying, but because they want to get away with this for as long as possible. They are not worried about the truth hurting you; they are concerned about the impact the truth will have on their fun.

It’s rare that someone would only act selfishly in regards to a relationship. Instead, it tends to be their general approach to everything in life. Consider if they generally lack empathy and have a tendency to consider their own needs at the exclusion of others. These sorts of people will often speak of how they deserve happiness and may play the martyr or victim routinely.

They may enjoy the power that comes from deception.

These are worst type of cheaters. The actual affair may be ancillary to them; their primary motivation is the power and glee they gain from manipulating those around them. Although this type of person is obvious in some ways, when you’re under their spell woven with gaslighting and emotional abuse, your view is blurry.

These are the cheaters that will respond with outrage at your accusation, no matter how damning the evidence is against them. They will turn the fingers back at you, painting you as crazy, irrational or unfaithful in your own right.

It’s very difficult to see gaslighting when you’re in it. If you suspect that this may be your situation, talk to others you trust to gain their perspective and find a way to take a little break from the relationship to give yourself some space to think clearly.

They may be too scared to admit the truth.

They know they messed up. They know the truth will hurt you and they don’t want to hurt you. On one level, they may believe they are doing the right thing. Protecting you. On another level, they are afraid of seeing the hurt, the betrayal in your eyes and knowing that they are the one who put that there.

This puts you in a tough place. Your suspicions make you anxious and their response makes you frustrated and confused. Your emotions are high, yet the best way to uncover the truth is to stay calm so that they feel safer in revealing it. Is it fair to ask you to temper your emotions when they are the ones misbehaving? No. But then again, nothing about infidelity is fair. 

The good news is that this is the type of cheater that often feels great remorse for their actions. They are ones most likely to take responsibility when they are ready to face the truth. Patience may be called for here as you give them to space to summon up the courage needed to speak, but you also have the right to set your own boundaries about what you will not tolerate.

They may believe they are innocent.

Perhaps they define infidelity differently than you do and so even though they’ve crossed your line, they are still safely on the innocent side of their own demarkation. This happens often when there is an emotional affair; the betrayed partner is picking up on the emotional distance and redirected attention while the other proclaims their integrity is intact because the clothes have stayed on. Before accepting their proclamation of innocence, ensure that you are indeed talking about the same thing.

This can also happen when the betrayer is a pro at compartmentalization or rationalization. They see themselves as a “good” person, someone who would never cheat on their partner. And so they participate in impressive mental gymnastics in an attempt to reconcile their actions with their beliefs about themselves.

They may come up with a reason that the affair is inconsequential (“We only have sex. There is no emotional component, so it doesn’t impact my marriage.”). Or, they may keep that side of themselves completely separate from their normal guise, often using alcohol or other substances to help block out (or excuse) their actions.

This situation can be tricky to suss out, especially if they only show you the “good” side. Pay attention to how they handle mistakes and embarrassing situations. If they have a tendency to secret these relatively banal things away, it’s an indication that they have a tendency to split when experiencing shame.

They may be innocent.

This best case may be the real case. It’s possible that you misinterpreted something or allowed your fears or past experiences to reach false conclusions. Of course, you also have to be careful not to rush to the perceived security of this assumption too quickly. Because once we believe something, we inadvertently seek confirmation that it is true. And you don’t want your denial to offer a safe hiding place for a cheater.

Just as you don’t want to provide a safe haven for a cheater, you also don’t want to create a hostile environment for an honest person where they are constantly bombarded with fake accusations. This is why it’s important to pay close attention to your reactions, trust yourself to see and handle the truth, and keep your eyes open in regards to your partner. Don’t excuse their stuff and also don’t accuse them of yours.

So what can you do if you have suspicions that your partner denies?

Start here – What to Do When You Think Your Partner is Cheating

Five Signs That You May Be in Denial

Posted on by stilllearning2b

If I had been able to be honest with myself during my first marriage, I would have known that something was wrong.

But I wasn’t honest with myself. Instead, I was doing the adult equivalent of the child hiding under the covers when a strange noise reverberates throughout the house. Part of my brain was acting in an attempt to protect me; keeping me blinded from the truth and providing me with the illusion of security.

At the time (and even in the months following the brutal discovery of what was happening beyond my closed eyes), I wasn’t able to tell that I was in denial. When asked, I would describe in detail the extreme efforts that my ex undertook to keep the truth hidden from me. But I would stubbornly refuse to acknowledge the efforts I went to in order to keep the truth from myself.

Looking back, these are the five signs that suggested that I was in denial:

 

1 – I Made Excuses

I attributed my stress to work. I brushed off my then-husband’s strange comment to his health-related tension. I excused the rejected debit card as a miscommunication with the bank. There was always a reason for everything, and that reason never had anything to do with my husband embezzling marital funds or seeking another wife.

When excuses, for yourself or others, become the knee-jerk reaction, it’s a sign that you may be ignoring something important. Pay attention to your pardons. If they are frequent, especially with regards to a certain person or situation, it would be wise to consider looking deeper.

 

2 – My Reactions Were Over-the-Top

When my husband would call and announce that he would be home late from work, I would have to fight back my initial strong response. When he made a minor – and admitted or visible – mistake, I would find myself becoming irrationally upset. And that’s because I wasn’t responding to the situation at hand; I was reacting to what I was not allowing myself to see.

Pay attention to your reactions. If they are consistently rating a 10 in response to a level 2 or 3 offense, your emotions may be due to something else entirely. Take a moment and explore what is really upsetting you.

 

3 – Certain Thoughts or Topics Were Off Limits

We never talked about what would happen if our relationship didn’t go the distance. We never discussed infidelity or the temptations that all people can encounter. I never allowed my thoughts to wander in the direction of my husband being anything but loving towards me.

When certain topics are in the no-go zone (either between you or even within your own mind), it is an indication that you may be intentionally refusing to explore what is hidden there. Those darkened spaces become the closet where the monstrous secrets can hide until they grow too big to contain.

 

4 – I Had an Underlying Current of Anxiety

It was electric, a strange buzz that radiated through my entire body. It came on slowly, so it was difficult to say for certain that it hadn’t always been there. It reminded me of the spidey sense I get as a teacher before a fight breaks out – it’s a physical awareness of emotional energy.

Even when our brains are stubbornly refusing to acknowledge something, our bodies are often clued-in. Pay attention to your physical symptoms – elevated heart rate or blood pressure, stomach issues or frequent illness. Your body may be trying to tell you something.

 

5 – There Was a Disconnect Between Observations and Conclusions

I believed that my husband was a good man. Kind. Caring. And hard-working. Yet there were times that his actions didn’t support those presumptions. So I simply brushed those times aside.

This is confirmation bias at its worst – we make conclusions and then proceed to seek out evidence that supports it and reject any information to the contrary. This is a cognitive distortion that we are all subject to, yet awareness of it goes a long way in limiting its reach. Don’t allow your conclusions to be so entrenched that you ignore any further observations.

 

Denial seems like it’s a comfortable place. After all, the child hiding beneath the covers convinces himself that there is safety to be found on the bed. At the same time, he is held prisoner beneath the sheets, convincing himself that to step out from the covers would be dangerous even as he constantly worries about what lurks outside.

Instead, if the child throws back the sheets and summons the courage to investigate the strange noise, the worry dissipates as he either discovers that the threat is imagined or he learns the true nature of the danger.

Denial comes a great cost. It provides you with some temporary security and asks for your constant fear in return. Trust that you can face whatever scares you and you will find that your fear fades away.

 

It Stays With You

Posted on by stilllearning2b

Texas has been getting pummeled with repeated rounds of severe storms. And Texans aren’t surprised. Because they’ve come to expect these epic storms. It’s familiar territory.

And once you’ve been a Texan (raises hand), you’ve always been a Texan. With a Texan’s memories and expectations.

These are some pictures of flooding in San Antonio, where I spent my formative years.

From a young age, I was schooled to avoid creeks and low lying areas during any kind of decent rainfall. In driver’s education, we spent the better part of a class learning about the signs of a flooded roadway and the repercussions of ignoring those signs. This was harder than you may imagine, as the literal measuring sticks at flood-prone intersections usually ended up underwater themselves. Even before I started driving, I learned alternate routes through the city that avoided the roads that had a tendency to submerge. That included a stretch of I-10 through downtown.

As a child, I watched with horror the footage of a school bus swept off the road by raging floodwaters, teenagers desperately grasping onto trees awaiting helicopter rescue. When I went tubing down the Guadalupe River every summer, I would stare up, way up, at the high water marks on the trees and rocks. I was stranded by water several times, unable to leave the house or unable to return.

As you can imagine, this stayed with me.

Even though Atlanta’s soil is actually permeable (unlike the slooow-draining limestone under a dusting of dirt that supports San Antonio), I still react defensively when the rain starts pounding. I mentally catalog potentially flooded roadways (a rarity here) and think about the closest high ground.

When my ex (also from San Antonio) and I purchased our first home in Atlanta, we viewed it with Texas eyes and insisted upon full coverage flood insurance even though we were not officially in a flood plain. We didn’t care. We saw that small, tame creek and didn’t trust it. Because we had both witnessed the incredible transformation of trickles into torrents in mere moments. In our ten years there, we never did use that insurance (although the flood map was redrawn a few years before we left and the house was deemed to be in the flood plain. Validation:) )

Of course, we didn’t buy the insurance with the expectation of using it. We bought it just in case. Protection against an unlikely but previously experienced outcome.

I didn’t have cheating, lying husband insurance.

Perhaps I should have. But that was an unexpected storm, one that I had never experienced and never saw coming.

One that I have now experienced.

And it stays with me.

 

The Faux Commute

Posted on by stilllearning2b

In the book I’m reading right now, the main character continues her weekday commute into London months after she was terminated from her job. Part of her motivation seemed to be habit and a lack of purpose and direction. But the main reason she continued the act is because she was too ashamed to tell her landlord/flatmate that she was no longer employed.

When I drove to work Friday morning, the book fresh on my mind, I peered at my fellow commuters, wondering if any of them were burning fuel and hours on a faux commute to a job that no longer existed. If any of them were keeping up the pretense while using up the savings. I pondered spouses back home, blindly secure in the belief that their partner was gainfully employed and unaware of the daily play-act.

It seems like something meant for fiction.

But it’s not.

My ex husband did it too.

He was too ashamed to concede that he could not find work. So he pretended that he could.
For years, he simulated a job. He invented clients and projects. He manufactured payments from lines of credit. I’m pretty sure he even falsified an award. Apparently, he was the best at his pretend job.

And he’s not the only one.

A friend’s first husband pretended to be enrolled in school full time while spending time in bars.

A coworker’s husband fabricated a start-up business while engaging in an affair.

And there’s a woman in my periphery who spent her time shopping while maintaining the facade of employment.

Here is a related piece I wrote for The Good Men Project that explores how this shame around employment can grow and spread through families.

But the problem isn’t just that the secret is kept from the partners.

Often the person can’t even admit it to themselves.

Continuing the faux commute and maintaining pretense even for themselves.

Now obviously most of us will never hold down a pretend job and engage in a daily trip of make-believe.

But that doesn’t mean we don’t engage in our own faux commutes.

That there aren’t truths we’d rather not face and so we keep us the pretense, even for ourselves.

That we don’t catch a ride going nowhere because we’re afraid to admit that it’s a dead-end run.

That we don’t pretend that something is still working for even when we no longer work for it.

So take an honest look at your life.

And make sure all of your commutes are authentic.

The book is called The Girl on the Train and it is a great thriller, especially for anyone who has experienced gaslighting.

Is Your Divorce Malignant? Here’s How to Survive

Posted on by stilllearning2b

When I was going through my divorce, others often felt the need to tell me about their own divorces. I heard stories of couples signing the paperwork and then going to have coffee. Some spoke of marriages that quietly faded and negotiations that barely sullied the mediator’s desk. I encountered women at the gym who whispered over sweaty shoulders, “Just wait until you get his money; it’ll all be worth it then,” as though a divorce was some get-rich-quick scheme I entered willingly. And all of this was years before the advent of “conscious uncoupling;” I think if I had caught wind of that phrase, I would have run off to some desert island where there are no lawyers.

If you’re facing a malignant divorce, see my eleven tips to help you survive on The Good Men Project.