How To Forgive Yourself After An Affair: 5 Steps

Forgive Yourself After Affair

It is essential to get out from the plethora of emotions that can ruin your self-image. Embracing forgiveness is not as easy as it sounds when you are the one to forgive yourself after an affair, but there are ways. Here are some tips on how to forgive yourself after an affair.

I know that it is probably inconceivable to you that you could forgive yourself after an affair. I mean, you have gone against everything you thought you knew about yourself and you are, most likely, stuck in this place of self-loathing.

What I can tell you is that it is possible to forgive yourself after an affair, that there will come a time when you will be able to hold your head up high and trust yourself again. You just need to take some action steps to get there.

Here are 5 steps on how to forgive yourself after an affair.

Overcome this cheating guilt. You can do it!

1. Have compassion for yourself.

How to forgive yourself after an affair
Embracing Forgiveness: How To Forgive Yourself for cheating

I am guessing that you probably hate yourself right now. You have let yourself, and everyone you know, down and it’s something that you never would have expected of yourself.

I am also guessing that you believe that you are stupid and weak and immoral and friendless and you are feeling embarrassed and angry and sad and overwhelmed.

And all of those things are natural. They are the things that we think and feel when we have let ourselves, and those around us, down. But I encourage you to have compassion for yourself. After all, you are only human!

I had a client who was absolutely destroyed that she had had an affair. Both of her parents cheated and she never thought that she would do the same. But she did.

What we came to realize as we talked about it was that she had been really struggling. Her mother just died, her kids were teenagers, the finances were tight. And, as a result, she was vulnerable to doing something self-destructive to mask the way she was feeling. Usually, she used ice cream or wine to self-soothe but this time it was different. This time it was a man and an affair.

This is not to say that she dove right into the affair. She and this man were friends. They confided in each other. She could explain to him what she was struggling with in a way that she couldn’t explain to her husband. She felt safe with him. She trusted him.

She barely even noticed that she was developing feelings for him until one day, out of the blue, he kissed her. Before you knew it, there were on the slippery slope down to infidelity.

Why I am telling you her story is this – my client never set out to have an affair. She was in a really dark place, vulnerable, and she opened herself up to someone else for comfort. She was not an evil person – she was a person in the world, a vulnerable person who made a mistake.

Having compassion for yourself is not justifying your cheating but, rather, it is a way for you to forgive yourself after an affair. If you can understand that you are only human, that you were in a place where you needed something to help you cope, and that you never set out to be unfaithful, then you will be well on your way to forgiving yourself.

Read: 9 Steps That’ll Help You Love Yourself Better

2. Commit to walking away.

I know that for most of my clients who are having an affair, walking away is the hardest thing to do. ‘But I love him,’ they say. ‘How can I live without him?’

Because they believe that their affair partner is the only person who can make them happy, they can’t walk away. As a result, they just continue this cycle of letting themselves down which, in turn, only leads to more self-hatred.

I truly believe that the reason it’s so hard to walk away from an affair is not because of your affair partner but because of the person you are when you are with them.

Think about it. Think about who you are in real life. Are you a mother, a brother, an employee, a chauffeur? Do you volunteer and work long hours and struggle with finances and have no sex life? Has it been years since you have really felt like yourself?

When people have affairs they suddenly become re-acquainted with the person they used to be. They feel happy, hopeful, sexy, beautiful, wanted, special. And that is what is so hard to walk away from – being that person again.

So, I encourage you to, if you want to forgive yourself after an affair, walk away from your person. I know that you think that you can’t live without that person but consider trying to love yourself – to stay in touch with the person you were in the affair when you are out of it.

If you can be the person you want to be in life, you won’t need something else that isn’t good for you. Something that alternately makes you feel good about yourself for a few minutes and then filled with self-hatred a few minutes later!

3. Dig into the source.

As I said before, many people who have an affair are people who are in a rough spot. People who were struggling with issues before the affair even started.

One of my clients was in a really tough spot.  She was depressed, lonely, lost, and unsure what to do about it. It seemed that, no matter what she tried, she couldn’t get out of this spot. We tried working together to get through this but then she disappeared.

By the time she reappeared, she was having an affair. She had embarked on one when we were still talking but she had stopped coming because she was in this affair and it was making her feel good about herself, feel loved and feel connected again. She figured she didn’t need me anymore.

But then she came back. Why? Because her affair no longer made her feel that way. Instead, her affair has started to make her feel even worse. Why is it that you got into your affair? I am guessing that it’s not something that you set out to do but something that happened over time, something that you thought you could manage.

It is important to identify what you are struggling with, what might have been the thing that made you vulnerable to infidelity.

For my client, she had just returned from living overseas and she was struggling with re-entry. She felt like she no longer fit in with her community and she felt lonely and lost. I explained to her that, in order to forgive yourself after an affair, it is essential that you take a good hard look at where you were in the world that would allow you to go someplace that you never thought you would go.

So, what are you struggling with that might have made you vulnerable to infidelity? Think about it. Seek to get help to work on it. If you can soothe yourself, instead of looking to your affair partner to do so, you will be way more likely to forgive yourself after an affair!

4. Be honest.

Steps to Forgive Yourself and Get Rid of The Pain Of Infidelity

Part of forgiving yourself after an affair is starting to like yourself again. Starting to act like the person you want to be in the world. A person who people can respect. Not the person you are now that you are in an affair.

So, how can you do that if you aren’t honest with yourself and your partner? If you can’t take ownership of what has happened and the hurt that you have caused?

I have a client whose husband had an affair. It had happened a while back but they had never been able to work through it because he refuses to talk about it. She so wants to, so that she can understand what happened but he just won’t get into it.

And, what has happed as a result? Their marriage is actually getting worse and not better because every time he isn’t honest with his wife he knows that he is letting her down. He knows that by acting like the affair wasn’t a big deal he is only hurting his wife more. And that definitely isn’t helping him forgive himself.

So, be honest with yourself and with those around you about your affair. It is important that you all have the space and time to process what has happened so that you can work through it and so that you can forgive yourself and maybe even be forgiven!

Read: An Amazing Thing Happens When You Get Honest With Yourself

5. Give it time.

The old saying that ‘time heals all wounds’ is an accurate one. While the pain of the fact that you had an affair might always be with you, over time the pain will dull and you will be able to go on with your life.

That being said, you can’t just sit there and wait for time to pass. It is important that you do the work that you need to do to work through what has happened and why you had an affair. It is essential that you are honest with yourself and with others about the affair and its aftermath. It is important that you work to get in touch with the person you were before the affair before the struggles started. The person who you looked at in the mirror and liked.

If you can do these things, if you can do things that make you feel good about yourself and strong and capable and not vulnerable to things that aren’t good for you, then time will truly heal all wounds.

As you continue to be the person you want to be, to get stronger, to own up to your mistakes, you will find that forgiving yourself after an affair is possible.

I hope that now you know that it is possible to forgive yourself after an affair. Getting to that place of forgiveness is all on you, though. 

You have to do the hard work. This guilt won’t just pass. But, if you have read this far, I am guessing that you are determined to make a change, to do what you need to do, to move forward, and forgive yourself.

You can do it!

Written By: Mitzi Bockmann
Originally Appeared On: Let your Dreams Begin

A mistake is something that always yields a wrong result, by making a wrong decision. Deciding to have an affair isn’t always a desperate attempt to get out, but sometimes, an attempt to stay in and survive.

But, again that doesn’t qualify anyone to be a cheater, yet most of the people whose messy emotions got a hold on them regret it later. And there comes a time you believe it’s right that others should despise you because you do the same.

People who have an affair tend to carry a lot of burden on their shoulders; a load of guilt and fear. You don’t need to carry that weight for long. Your mistakes never define you but your actions to move on from your past mistakes do.


Frequently Asked Question (FAQs):

How to get over infidelity pain?

Does it ever go away? No matter if you’re the cheater or you’ve been cheated on, the pain stays. Understanding your emotions is the major step towards healing from the pain of infidelity. Embracing forgiveness is essential for your own healing and your relationship.

How long does it take to forgive an affair?

For some people, it takes a couple of weeks based on the couple’s understanding. But, for some people, it takes years and even after, it gets tough to accept the reality and trust the person again. It all depends on the person’s ability of emotional pain processing.

Can extramarital affairs be true love?

An affair is an attraction for a time being where someone looks out to fill an emotional void. A phase of feeling alive and wanted and loved. But this phase doesn’t stay for long as the couples having an affair have never been together in a real sense. True love requires embracing both the situation positive and negative, which unfortunately an affair can never cope with.

Forgive Yourself After Affair pin

— About the Author —

Leave a Reply



Up Next

10 Unexpected Signs Of Cheating: How To Tell If Your Spouse Is Having An Affair

Unexpected Signs Of Cheating: Beyond the Obvious

If you are googling “surprising and unexpected signs of cheating” at 2 in the morning, then you’ve come to the right place. Well, we all have been there. Suspicion and doubt can sneak up like an uninvited guest when it comes to your spouse; something tells you that something is wrong, but you just can’t put your finger on it.

When it comes to infidelity, it’s not always about the lipstick on the collar or mysterious phone calls at night. There can be many subtle signs of cheating that you might overlook and miss out on.

So go grab some coffee (or something stronger) and explore all the hidden signs you spouse



Up Next

The Cheaters’ Playbook: 3 Types Of Men Who Have Affairs

The Cheaters' Playbook: Types Of Men Who Have Affairs

Have you ever wondered why do some men have affairs? It isn’t always because they’re just looking for excitement or are bored. There’s usually more to it. There are actually 3 types of men who have affairs, and we are going to do a deep dive into that today.

In a perfect world, love would keep everyone on course, but the truth is we often have to deal with betrayal and heartbreak. We’re going to take a close look at the 3 types of men who have affairs, some of the glaring traits of men who cheat, and most importantly, why do men have affairs.

Let’s start with understanding the traits of men who cheat.



Up Next

How Does A Narcissist Act When Caught Cheating? 6 Things A Narcissistic Partner Might Say

How Does A Narcissist Act When Caught Cheating? Statements

How does a narcissist act when caught cheating? If you have ever been with a narcissist, you know what happens when a narcissist is caught cheating, and all the absurd things they say to justify their actions. Let’s explore 6 statements a narcissists makes when a narcissist gets caught cheating.

KEY POINTS

A narcissistic partner may routinely say six things when they are caught cheating.

These statements are manipulative and are meant to get you to believe that you are the one at fault.

An understanding of how these statements influence your judgment may help.



Up Next

How To Get Over Emotional Cheating: 10 Practical Tips

Practical Tips On How To Get Over Emotional Cheating

Finding out that the person you love the most is in love with someone else can be one of the most heartbreaking experiences. Emotional cheating can not only shatter a relationship, but it can also traumatize and emotionally break the other partner. Let’s learn how to get over emotional cheating and start the healing process

What Does Emotional Cheating Mean?

Also known as emotional infidelity or emotional affair, it refers to a relationship where one person falls in love with, becomes emotionally intimate or develops a romantic bond with someone else outside their primary relationship or marriage.



Up Next

The 3 Most Common Types Of Cheaters: Uncovering The Love Fraudsters

Most Common Types Of Cheaters: The Silent Echoes Of Deceit

In every love story, the sweet haze of romance often hides some unsettling figures lurking in the shadows—figures of deceit that can turn sweet stories bitter. When it comes to infidelity and cheating, you might be a bit surprised to know that there are different types of cheaters, mainly 3 types of cheaters.

Revealing these types of cheaters might bring out uncomfortable truths, but they’re important for understanding the complex world of human emotions. Through their different ways of dishonesty, they show the complicated and tangled nature of cheating. Each one represents a warning about the rough patches that love can sometimes



Up Next

Can A Narcissist Be Faithful? 18 Reasons Why They Cheat (And Why They Don’t)

Can A Narcissist Be Faithful? Reasons They Can Be

Can a narcissist be faithful? This question delves into the intricate world of narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) and the complex dynamics of relationships involving narcissists. 

Understanding the psychology behind this topic is crucial for those who have encountered or are currently involved with narcissistic individuals. Let us explore the nature of narcissism, the reasons why a narcissist can be unfaithful, as well as the factors that might lead them to exhibit faithfulness. 

Can a Narcissist be Faithful in a Relationship?

Can a narcissist be faithful? This is a nuanced question and doesn’t really have a straightforward answer.



Up Next

The 3 Least Loyal Zodiac Signs Who Seem Allergic To Commitment

Three Least Loyal Zodiac Signs: A Guide To Avoid Red Flag

The precious bond that fortifies connections and defines true devotion is loyalty. But these three least loyal zodiac signs are masters of unpredictability, challenging the very essence of commitment.

While the zodiac can offer insights into our strengths and weaknesses, it’s also known for pointing out our less desirable traits. 

Brace yourself, for we’re about to unveil the truth about the least loyal zodiac signs. From the silver screen to real life, these signs have left a trail of disloyalty that’s hard to ignore. 

So, if you’re ready to dive into the drama, let’s explore the traits of these most disloyal zodiac signs!

Read more he