You’d think that a wayward spouse would be so aware of his or her weakness and so aware of the pain inflicted that he or she would be thoughtful enough to make every effort to avoid further contact with the lover. Instead, the wayward spouse often argues that the relationship was “only sexual” or was “only emotional, but not sexual” or some other peculiar description to prove that continued contact with the lover would be okay.
Most betrayed spouses intuitively understand the danger and demand that all contact with a lover end for life. Permanent separation not only helps prevent a renewal of the affair, but it is also a crucial gesture of consideration to the betrayed spouse.
In spite of career sacrifices, friendships, and issues relating to children’s schooling, I recommend with all seriousness that there be a sudden and complete end to an affair. And I recommend extreme measures to ensure total separation for life from a former lover.
Several years ago, I owned and operated ten chemical dependency treatment clinics. At first, we used several different treatment strategies. For some, we tried to encourage moderation, and for others we tried to achieve total abstinence. It wasn’t long before all the counselors agreed that total abstinence was the only way to save drug or alcohol addicts from their self-destructive behavior.
Unless they completely abandoned the object of their addiction, the addiction usually returned. For these people, moderation was impossible. The conviction that their drug of choice was off-limits to them for life, helped end their cycle of addiction-treatment-addiction.
My strategy for ending an affair with total separation from the lover developed after my experience treating addicts. And, over the years, I’ve found my total-separation strategy to be very effective in ending affairs in a way that makes marital recovery possible. Without total separation, marital recovery is almost impossible.
An affair is a very powerful addiction. The craving to be with the lover can be so intense that objective reality doesn’t have much of a chance. The fact that a spouse and children may be permanently injured by this cruel indulgence doesn’t seem to matter. All that matters is spending more time with the lover. That makes it an addiction.
Even the one-night stand may be an addiction. It may not be an addiction to a particular lover, but it may still be an addiction—to one-night stands. In affairs that have low emotional attachment, the addiction is often to the act of having sex itself, rather than to a particular lover.
The addiction to one-night stands can also grow from a need to be continually assured of one’s attractiveness. People who indulge in such practices want to feel that they can have anyone they want, even that person over there sitting at the bar. These people who need constant reassurance of their attractiveness must learn some other way to gain that assurance—a way that does not destroy their marriage.
The analogy between chemical addiction and an affair is striking. In both cases, the first step toward recovery is admitting that the addiction is self-destructive and harmful to those whom the addict cares for most—his or her family.
After recognizing the need to overcome the addiction, the next step is to suffer through the symptoms of withdrawal. Addicts are often admitted to a hospital or treatment program during the first few weeks of withdrawal to ensure total separation from the addicting substance.
The way to overcome an addiction is tried and proven—abstain from the object of addiction. Alcoholics, for example, must completely avoid contact with any alcoholic beverage to gain control over their addictive behavior. They must avoid places where alcohol is likely to be found, such as bars and parties. They must even avoid friends who drink occasionally in their presence. They must surround themselves with an alcohol-free environment. In the same way, when a wayward spouse separates from the lover, extraordinary precautions must be taken to avoid all contact with the lover—for life.
Of course, my advice is not easy to implement. Many people who have had an affair try but fail to make a drastic and decisive break with their lover.
The above article is adapted from the book, Surviving an Affair, by Dr. Willard F. Harley and Dr. Jennifer Harley Chalmers, published by Fleming H. Revel. This book is a guide to understanding and surviving every aspect of infidelity—from the beginning of an affair through the restoration of the marriage.
The authors Drs. Harley and Chalmers describe why affairs begin and end, how to end an affair, how to restore the marriage after the affair, how to manage resentment, and how to rebuild trust. It also guides you step-by-step from the devastating blow of infidelity to a loving and trusting marriage.
There is also an additional article written by Dr Harley, which is featured on the web site for the Family Dynamics Institute, that you might find helpful. You can read it by clicking onto the link provided below:
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(USA) Hi Angel, Firstly, the email account being closed is absolutely a blessing! Sometimes things that cause us to sin (stumbling blocks as the bible calls them) have to be cut off cold turkey.
You have to battle this one day at a time. It’s actually going to be more like a few hours at a time, initially, then a day at a time, then a week at a time, etc. until you no longer have to fight the urge off at all.
Keep in mind – it is a SIN for you to be contacting this man for unpure reasons or even thinking about him.
Now that it is done, you have to focus on God. This means every time you think of him, want to email him, etc. stop, pray and open your bible and read until the urge goes away. This is the ONLY way you can move on. Replacing unpure things with pure things.
It’s hardly any different than a drug addiction. Your feelings break down to an emotional addiction (the other man is what feeds it) and now that it’s not being fed, you are going through withdrawal. You have a long, hard withdrawal period but feeding your addiction by giving in to your urges will keep you from ever moving on. Don’t feed the addiction anymore!
It is the RIGHT (and righteous) thing to move on. It is pleasing to God. It is unpleasing to God when you give in to the urges. The way to move on from this addiction is to focus on God and focus on cutting the sin out of your life. As you can see, it is a BIG job and that’s what will fill up the void. Where you used to sin and have an affair, now you have to replace it with learning the habit of not sinning and cutting the affair off. It’s like throwing away an old habit and unlearning it, and learning a new habit and new way of life. One without the affair.
Keep plugging through it. It’s very difficult at first but gets easier over time. It’s like a car accident victim or stroke victim learning how to walk again.
Consider these verses: Mark 9:43-49 – it talks about sin that can keep someone from entering the kingdom of God and in this passage it says whatever is causing someone to sin, it must be plucked out. Your affair MUST be plucked out of your life – COMPLETELY.
God has taken it away from you cold turkey. He’s giving you guidance by doing this and telling you the right direction to walk in but it’s up to you to follow that guidance. You’ve been given the road to take – you must now make your choice over whether to follow it (the right road out of sin) or whether to stay in it and continue thinking about a man who is not your husband. A man Satan is using to play on your emotions and draw you away from God and threaten your very entrance into the kingdom of God.
Please do the right thing. Don’t even think about sending an email to the work account. Look at it this way – doing that would be playing right into the devil’s hand. You’re tearing yourself up, you’re tearing your marriage up and you’re lying to your child to cover your sin. When you look at it that way (and that’s my perspective as an objective outsider and fellow sister in Christ), it makes it a little clearer what is really going on and hopefully makes it easier to push those thoughts out of your mind each time they crop up. You will need to practice putting those thoughts out of your mind every moment until they no longer come and that will take a few weeks or months.
I will keep you in my prayers. With love and hope, LT
(USA) Is it normal to feel exhausted and why?
(USA) Dear LT, Wow! Thank you for your heart and the time you took to share with Angel.
I’ve been suffering in silence for 5 days of NC. It breaks my heart and almost overwhelms me with grief that I must cut off all contact with my best friend forever.
I tried to have it all – being married with children AND still have the romance and excitement I craved with my best friend. I never would’ve cheated with a man. My guard was up. That was completely off limits.
But Satan got to me thru the back door. It was unlocked. I’ve never had lesbian tendencies. But one kiss and … I’ve been "happily" in bondage for 4 yrs. Living a lie. Pretending to be a good Christian. And unable to break off my relationship.
Last week, I thank God for new strength. My BF and I have both been convicted that God can never bless our sinful lives. I was trading my stable marriage and the future of my relationship with my children for something that could never be. It was a mirage.
Even though I knew from the beginning it was wrong and would never work, I continued for 4 years. I can’t put my finger on why.
Your advice of "replace your behavior with learning the habit of not sinning and cutting the affair off. " is so true. It’s exactly what Beth Moore teaches in "Breaking Free" and "Why Godly People do Ungodly Things." So why haven’t I mastered it yet?
Your post helped and encouraged me. Now that the A is officially over, I need to continue to run to His Word and read the Bible until my obsessive feeling fades. Days that I do not begin with prayer and submission, I am ripe for a huge battle.
Here’s my prayer, "Lord, for all of us whom You are convicting to end our sinful relationships, give us courage. Help us to see our wrongful behavior and confess it to You. And please use this blog and other godly people to support us as we repent by turning away from that bad habit. Lord, may we turn to You to satisfy our need for relational intimacy. May we seek You with all our hearts. Thank you for helping us to connect to one another on this blog. May you use this to help open our eyes and heal our hearts. Amen"
(USA) I am in same boat, sinking, and I am a "Christian" too in a very public position. I broke it off twice and now he won’t take me back this last time! Both of us are married and would never have let our spouses know! He’s a fool! He says he doesn’t want to hurt me anymore! He’s hurting me now! He’s doing a no contact thing with me, I guess. And his wife doesn’t even know.
Each time I ended it I changed my number and hurt him, I guess. Then I called him 3 days later crying “I’m sorry, I love you.” We’ve been in love ten years and consummated it last September. Now it’s over? My husband is a better man altogether! But it’s the high, the emotion the euphoria, I miss and so I called him Saturday after two weeks of no calls by either of us. He didn’t answer or call me back.
Last time he didn’t call me back, I said horrible things on his voice mail, and he called back then! We both cried. I know he loves me but wants it to end! Why? Because I hurt him? Why would a man give up a non-threatening affair? He said it’s for me and watch the movie Roman Holiday???
(USA) I didn’t think the above (last) post posted. I typed it through my cell phone, sorry for the spelling and stuff. Anyways, it sounds like I am a young girl or something, but I am 43 and he is 52, no young hotties. (Well, not young…..hotties, maybe : )
It has been one long almost ten year emotional affair, and then, because I knew I wasn’t getting any younger, I took it to the next level, cautiously. But he responded, and it was intense.
And the calls, the calls, the calls! I think it affected him more so than me, and he always told me that I’d never know how much he loves me, and he doesn’t want to hurt me or my family (husband). When I screamed horrible things at him, about me being his whore, (I knew better, but I also knew it would make him call me), he called mad as can be and said he’d never be over me, bla bla bla, and love doesn’t disappear, bla bla bla. But he’s doing a no contact!
Is he scared of me now, that I went off on him? He knows I’d never risk my position (in the church) and family by telling anyone. I think he is doing it for me and himself, and his wife and daughters and his sanity. He knows we can never be together, and that always used to make him sad. Sadder than me.
And like you all- my husband is the better man, in every way.
Now I’m out of an addictive love affair, and out of a ten year emotionally charged friendship. It’s driving me crazy sad. It’s such a loss. It’s a hole. I have prayed, and each time I broke it off, it was with so much determination, and strength. Only to call him 3 days later, saying I missed him, and can’t leave him.
I don’t feel bad for crying with him the day I made him call me back, with those terrible things I said. I told him that that’s what happens: I’m hurting you, because you’re hurting me. I’m crying, I’m sad, this hurts and this sucks, and you’re gonna hear me cry! And I made him listen to me cry. When you love someone and you sleep with them, and then it starts ending, or ends, what do you expect? A lot of emotion, thats what!
I keep repeating NC=NH, like I read above. New contact= new hurt. And the new hurt is when I called Saturday, left a nice message, and haven’t got a call back. That’s the new hurt. I know he loves me. Maybe his wife found out, or was getting suspicious, or maybe I just want to think that, rather than to think he’d dump me?
(USA) Hi Janina, I recently wrote a post here to Angel and if you didn’t already read that, I’d suggest it to you because I think it applies to your situation as well.
The other thing that came to mind in reading your situation was this – I don’t think this other man is intentionally trying to hurt you. Here is what I think is going on (or at least what I hope is going on) – I think he simply is feeling the very strong tug to do the right thing.
The Godly thing is to end it. I hope, for both of your sakes, that this is why he is ending it. If he is doing it because of a spiritual conscience issue then it means God is seriously tapping him on the shoulder telling him, "uh uh", no no, what you are doing is wrong!
Even if that’s not the reason why he’s ending it, I believe God is also tapping your shoulder and telling you the same thing. No, no – it’s wrong.
You can drive yourself crazy wondering why but my suggestion, in addition to the suggestions I wrote in my post above to Angel, is to start reading the articles here on affairs but also on being a Godly woman. SOOO many of these articles have spoken to my spiritual heart over the year I’ve been coming to this site and have changed me into a better spiritual-minded person and I’m sure they can do the same for you. There were times when I read through some of them, in tears, knowing that God had directed me right to them because they were so fitting for my life. It’s a wonderful experience and I pray that happens for you, as well, over the next few weeks and months of your healing journey out of infidelity.
When you start wondering why it’s ending – tell yourself first that it’s because it is God’s will. He loves you so much he not only gave his Son’s life for all of us and our sins, but to you individually that he’s taking this affair from you to help keep you from giving in to your sinful desires.
He’s helping you by wanting to keep you from sinning in the first place. It’s hard at first but it is the right thing. You have to take over the reigns from here, though, and buckling down and being strong despite the pull of your flesh.
Being a Christian is a series of situations where we must die to the self. Stay strong and keep pushing through this. There could be a million reasons why this man is doing this but look at it this way : it’s God loving you so much He’s helping you to stop. That’s why it’s happening. With love, LT
(USA) Janina, If you are like me, during the first day of no contact (NC), you think you will go out of your mind. Do whatever you have to do to break past that 3 day NC. Be away from all phones.
I am starting to have my obsession replaced with peace. And the pain is still there. I think it will always be to some extent.
I agree with LT (isn’t she great!?) that he is not intentionally hurting you. And it is God’s will for both of you to become "disentangled".
Be thankful he is not crying to you and begging you not to end it. God brought you both to this point for a reason.
There’s much wisdom in these posts and many others. Use whatever you can to gather strength to get thru one minute at a time, then one hour at a time and soon it will be one day at a time.
(USA) Janina, One more thought… don’t think of it as he has dumped you. You both have agreed it should end twice before. So it has been on each of your hearts. He simply found the strength this time to initiate.
And why should he end a "nonthreatening" affair? I think you hit it on the head with the word "sanity". Could it be that living a lie is destroying him?
I feel so "unworthy" to give any insight. I’m on day 7 of NC. And I feel I could "fall" any moment. But I’ve been asking God for His help. By my own efforts, I am so fragile and weak. Godspeed.
(USA) Hi Janina and Marie, Just an FYI that I went through the same thing. It was almost an entire decade ago now. God got me through it but it was actually one of the worst times of my life; it was very difficult but my marriage was very bad as well so that’s what made that time even more confusing than it could have been. (I wasn’t leaving a great husband and marriage for my jollies. Satan knew how horrible (abusive) my marriage was and I played right into that temptation). I can’t say my husband was great, etc. He’s much more spiritually minded now, as am I, but I may try to give the details when I have more time in the future. I have been there, so I just wanted to share that in case my "credibility" was questionable.
I will say this – only and I mean ONLY God was what got me through. I would have never been able to do it on my own – it requires strength beyond human capabilities. Both of you ladies will get there. I just know it! Stay strong and when you feel weak, pray for more strength!
"Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.
For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened. "
Matthew 7:7-8
(USA) Thank you so much. I’m at work and cannot post but appreciate your words! Thanks!