Adultery - Avoid The Temptation

Adultery is something that we are all capable of but some of us have a greater willpower than others to resist such a temptation. Most people will accept, if they were being honest, that they occasionally feel an attraction towards someone other than their partner but only some of us will actually follow through and think with our body rather than with our brain.

Unfortunately adultery is one of the most common marriage problems and the main reason for divorce, with cheated spouses finding it impossible to recover from such a breakdown of trust.

Often affairs are driven on impulse, often when people are having a good time, perhaps a little too much to drink and are less likely to see the folly of their ways. All thoughts of sensible behaviour and the possible impact on the cheated partner and their relationship just vanish, with people just thinking of the here and now rather than what will happen in the light of day.

Temptation is all around us and with partners now spending so many hours apart, both working, often one spending long hours in the office, children to ferry around after work, time in the gym and all the other social activities that come with modern day living.

Like with most common marriage problems adultery just creeps up on a lot of people, often as a result of an attraction to someone who has become close over time, a familiar person, a friend who has been there when they have been needed and who the cheating partner has learned to feel comfortable with. So often you hear ‘it just happened, we couldn’t help it, you just weren’t there when I needed you’.

One side of the camp say it is almost impossible for you to have a platonic relationship with a member of the opposite sex. I tend to disagree, it can work but like with most things it depends on the individuals, the state of their current relationships and their susceptibility to give into feeling that go beyond the realms of platonic.

If a couple has started to grow apart, perhaps spending less and less time in each others company and has lost the intimacy in their relationship the need for sexual fulfilment is often a major driving factor when cheating on a spouse.

Affairs can often occur as a result of marital conflict, the stress of life on the relationship, the need for excitement or the inability to stay faithful and, with an increasing general acceptance of adultery the desire to resist temptation appears to have lessened.

The ability to save your marriage following an affair largely depends on the circumstances and the length of the affair. Cheated partners, for example, find infidelity easier to cope with a one off, never to be repeated mistake rather than, a long term, know what you were doing kind of relationship.

If you want to save your marriage you need to rebuild the trust in the relationship and to do that you have to be totally honest and upfront with one another.

The guidelines for the new relationship must be clear, and it will be a new relationship, the old marriage as you knew it will be a thing of the past. You need to be totally open and honest about the relationship with the cheating partner showing absolute remorse for what they have done. There has to be a complete change to your way of lives with all contact with the ‘other person’ stopped and social habits changed in order to meet that endeavour. Marriage counseling may or may not help and the decision to try such an avenue must be as a result of a joint decision for it to be really given a good chance to work.

The cheated partner must be able to let go of the resentment for what has been done, without the ability to move on and put the past behind the both of you the chances of surviving adultery, as a couple, are remote.

Above all, you must both be prepared to make personal changes in your lives, be prepared to refocus and work on the areas of your marriage that were causing a problem and perhaps a contributing factor towards the adultery.

If you still love each other fight for it, make an effort and save your marriage but learn from past mistakes, learn to appreciate each other, learn to become intimate again, just start from the beginning, don’t try and pick up where you left off, and let the renewed feelings for each other grow.