Forgiving a cheating spouse involves taking them back after you have discovered they have been unfaithful. However, it means more than simply saying “I forgive you”, and still keeping hold of pent-up feelings of anger and resentment in your heart. How can you tell if you have truly forgiven them?

Keep the Past in the Past

In the initial stages after you discover your spouse’s betrayal, it is only natural to talk about the actions of your partner and to want to relive the events that led up to their unfaithfulness. But if you have resolved in your heart to forgive him or her, past events of cheating need to stay firmly in the past.

It does not demonstrate true forgiveness if you dredge up the past each time your spouse disappoints you or falls short of your expectations. Doing so only informs them that you have not really forgiven them and that you continue to harbor resentment and animosity towards them.

Show a Genuine Desire to Make Your Marriage Work

Forgiving your spouse does not simply mean allowing them back into your life and into your bed again and then carrying on as if nothing has happened. Demonstrating true forgiveness of infidelity goes much further than that.

If you have truly forgiven your spouse for cheating on you, it is important to have a genuine desire to make your marriage work, not “just for the sake of the children” or to save face in the family, but because you personally wish to stay together with your spouse. Recovering from unfaithfulness will test your relationship to the very limits, but it can also draw you closer together as a couple and help you to reassess what is most important in life.

Marital unfaithfulness can tear a couple apart, but if each spouse is determined to make a go of their marriage, they can also draw closer together as a couple. In order to demonstrate true forgiveness of your spouse, you must keep the past in the past and show a genuine desire to make your marriage work.

By Sophie S.

Affairs and Cheating Affairs, Cheating, Forgiveness, Infidelity, Spouse

You go onto an online dating site, maybe to find out if an ex is there, just to see how he or she is doing. You connect with them or with someone else that seems interesting to you. The catch? You’re married already. And your marriage isn’t in shambles, and you aren’t unhappy, but you just wanted to see how the waters of online dating might treat you.

It’s an ego boost when you get a response and it feels good to have someone talk to you and to tell you all the things you want to hear. But when you’re already married, not only are you leading the other person on, but you’re also hurting the relationship you’re in right now.

Here are some signs that you need to start talking to your spouse more than you need to be on online dating websites:

• You spend hours on online dating sites
• You don’t tell your partner about your internet activity
• You hide your online history or delete it entirely
• You talk more to your online dates than you do to your spouse
• You don’t mention that you’re married

While there are bad marriages out there and there are times when you might want to talk to someone else about things you need in your life, the truth is that going behind your spouse’s back isn’t necessarily the way to solve your problems.

Maybe it’s time to get offline and start talking to your spouse instead.

Affairs and Cheating Exes, Marriage, Married, Spouse