so one of the common questions I get is what do I do if I find out that the person I love has slept with somebody else how am I supposed to deal with that and that's that's a pretty common question some people say if that happens I can never get over it and a lot of times that is the core belief before it happens like in other words most people will say I love whoever I'm with but if I ever found out that they cheated on me I could never get over that I could never get past it and they mean it they're being completely authentic but then when it actually happens they find out they're in so much pain because the reaction to somebody cheating on you isn't as logical as it is emotional logically you might think I don't want to be with him anymore how could I be with somebody that could betray me like that and that's a fair thought that's a reasonable thought what happens though is when somebody that we love that has given us a consistent level of value and importance suddenly not only stops giving us that value and importance but gives it to somebody else and a lot of times they're rejecting us while they're going to them or in the case of an affair they're not outwardly rejecting you but when you find out they've been sleeping with someone else it's almost like they retroactively rejected you and even if they've been with you that whole time you feel so betrayed that even the memory of your time together is now tainted so they've stolen that from you well again logically you're going to think well I don't want to be with somebody that would do that to me the problem is we're made up more of emotion than we want to admit we're made up of ego we're made up of fear of loss we're made up of hurt we're made of fear of regret so a lot of times when somebody breaks up with us even though we swore to ourselves we would never take somebody back if they did that to us you might find yourself not only willing to take them back but you might even find yourself desperate to take them back that's a normal reaction so let's say that maybe you assume that you never could but now you found out that they cheated on you and despite the hurt the feelings of betrayal the anger and everything else you find that you actually want to give it one more try you might even desperately want to give one more try but now you have the problem how do I get past what happened well the first thing is identifying exactly what caused it what I mean is you can kind of take infidelity and not all info Fidelity is the same and we all know that there's emotional cheating and then there's like virtual cheating now and then there's just the old-fashioned intimacy sleep with somebody else cheating but the truth is there's there's two other types besides that there's the kind that actually happens to people that aren't deceptive that aren't manipulators that aren't toxic like nobody's surprised when a narcissist or a manipulator or just an old-fashioned douchebag is cheating on you or you know an easy girl or however you want to say it if it's a woman there's always been that kind of identification of different types right the guy that's untrustworthy that's going to cheat on you and the girl is just too easy and sleeps with people behind your back well there's there's what you call the good guy version the good girl version but then there's the more complicated version in other words sometimes the person that cheats isn't necessarily the bad guy no I'm not saying that the person that cheated that there was a good reason I'm not saying that there's an excuse to be unfaithful or to to cheat on somebody that you're with there's not but not every case is the same for instance there's kind of the classic version of the cheater right there's the one that doesn't have a conscience the one that you find out has been having multiple Affairs throughout your marriage age or throughout the course of your relationship the one that only it only comes to light when they're caught and when they're caught they'll turn around and blame you they'll do everything they can to hide it and deny it and they don't actually show any signs of a conscience while they're doing it that's the bad version obviously we know about that the boss is sleeping with the secretary the the guy who goes off to war and finds out that his girlfriend's been sleeping with his friends while he was gone or the the girl that's like kind of like the the party easy girl that we all know those versions well there's another version of Unfaithful and there are a lot of times when the person who cheated never had any plans to cheat doesn't even have the moral character to consistently do it and never imagine that they would be in that spot but sometimes when you've been in a relationship long enough the person that we end up being attracted to many times is actually wired to be our opposite like Opposites Attract is a real thing so a lot of times the person we end up with that we initially have the most attraction for we start to take for granted and like the classic version of what I'm trying to say is maybe a woman and these are from real life examples maybe a woman's been married to an man for a long time and she says you're just too caught up in business you don't make enough time for me you don't make enough time for my family every time I really want to spend time with you I want to spend the weekend with you I want to have a romantic getaway but you've got a business plan you've got to make money uh you've got to go out you got to go out of town you're always working overtime and maybe the guy maybe he's a good guy I'm not blaming the guy I'm telling you like real life stories so the guy has the intent of look I'm working hard to take care of my family I'm doing this for our future and you know it's not like I enjoy work I'm sacrificing for you so even though she's telling him what she needs he doesn't really hear it he thinks he hears it but he doesn't really understand because in his mind he doesn't need it and we're all more wired differently than we think we think we're all basically all human and even though there's like different genders and different backgrounds and different personalities we're all basically wired the same so it's not sometimes somebody that maybe you've even been married to them for a long time is telling you as clearly as they can like in this situation she was telling him as clearly as she could I don't feel like I matter to you I don't feel like you'll make time for me my feelings keep getting deflected explained or excused because you're so focused on building our future for us but you're not really here from me some people are wired in a way that they need to know their feelings matter because they have more weight than somebody who's wired in a different way like some people are more relationship oriented and they could be married to somebody who's more goal oriented but they don't really realize how fundamentally different they actually are so the person wired to actually succeed to show love for his family isn't really understanding how much the woman is telling him look I need to know I matter I don't care about another million dollars in the bank I care about knowing on my birthday or on our son's birthday or on our anniversary or on Valentine's Day I'm gonna get your full focus and I'm going to matter more so sometimes we can be in a relationship for years where the other person has tried to tell the person they're with the person they genuinely love how much pain they're in and how much they need attention and affection how much they need to feel heard but we think we know better sometimes the person we're married to or maybe the person we've been to for years we decide that even though they're telling us what we need we decide we know better than them what they need and sometimes we decide even though they're telling us what we need we just decide we're not going to give it to them in that situation I'm describing I've seen it happen a lot of times that guy will say well she should know what I'm doing I'm working but by the way I'm tired of her complaining that I don't give her enough attention I need to feel encouraged why doesn't she tell me to go out and kill it more why isn't she asking what she can do to support me I mean I'm working hard to make money for us I'm tired of coming home and feeling like I'm dropping the ball somehow meanwhile she's starting to think it doesn't matter what I say it doesn't matter what I do that base need that she might really authentically have is going unmet and if anything happens when you stay in Conflict long enough you go from love into conflict that's normal if you stay in Conflict long enough you go into that numb State when you go into that numb state that other person is like the affection and the belief the belief in the relationship starts to just drain and suddenly that person's walking around feeling almost like an emotional zombie thinking is this really the best my life is going to get is this the closest thing to Passion I'm ever going to feel is this the closest thing to feeling loved I'm ever going to experience even if they consciously want to be a good husband or wife and stay with that person if that person hasn't been listening and hasn't been doing what they can to enthusiastically meet that base need sometimes that person will find themselves very vulnerable to cheating and it doesn't mean that they at their heart it doesn't mean that they want to cheat they might have been this person might have been somebody that spent their whole lives judging cheaters and saying I don't understand how somebody could do that I would never do that and now suddenly they're the person being led astray they're the person being tempted beyond what they ever thought they could be and then they find themselves and the arms are in the bed of somebody else now is that right no it's still not okay you could you should you still need to be honest you still need to to not be deceptive and and cheat on somebody being unfaithful is always painful and I'm not saying it all that there's an excuse for it but what I am saying is the situation I just described is not the same thing as a situation where somebody is just consciously engaging in repeated deception without a conscience without a concern hoping that they get away with it just hoping that they never get caught one is more understandable it's still wrong but you can work with that relationship you can save that so yeah you're still the offended party but if you realize maybe maybe that person and you know better than me right I'm just I'm just making a video but if you know that person who cheated on you at their core was a good loving loyal sincere person that you never could have imagined cheating on you has just cheated on you if that's the situation maybe you played a role in it I'm not saying that you caused it so calm down I'm not saying you caused it I'm saying that not every situation is equal and different people have different base needs you can't take somebody who values family like in that situation I'm describing again maybe that guy who's focused on business he's goal oriented right so so he feels fulfilled while he's accumulating success while he's meeting accomplishments and if you ask that guy to just take a job at a nine to five burger place he's going to be miserable he's going to break down inside and he's not going to have peace and sooner or later he's going to leave or he's just going to have a complete emotional collapse because you can't ask that guy who's wired to succeed to not try to succeed and he understands that but what he might not understand is the wife that he keeps telling he doesn't have time for maybe she's emotionally driven maybe she has the same need for a relationship that the man has for business success and asking her to Contin continuously constantly put her needs beneath his eventually is going to make her feel worthless to him there are some people that when you consistently tell them that their feelings don't mean enough don't matter enough for you to change what you're really telling them is that they don't matter enough for you to change in that situation if you can realize that maybe you played more of a role in it than you realize take a deep breath with that humility and regret and sorrow of understanding the pain you caused them you have an open door for forgiveness again it's not excusing what they did but if you can understand relationships are people hurting each other to some degree how I react is going to affect how my wife reacts my behavior is going to affect her behavior that's part of relationship so if this feature scenario one of the ways you can forgive is understanding the role you played and I've seen this play out it was one time I was watching a couple and and that kind of went over exactly what I just went over in this video except it was reversed it was the woman who was focused on doing what she needed to do and the husband had been telling her for years I don't feel like you want me sexually I don't feel like you're attracted to me I don't feel like you make time to hit on me or to come on to me or to just make me feel admired and respected and I resent it and I'm starting to feel not only hurt and wounded I'm starting to feel numb he'd been telling her this for years but she admitted later that she thought well I know he thinks he needs more respect I know he thinks he needs more attention but we have sex enough times we have sex once every two weeks that's plenty of times nobody really needs sex some people go without sex their entire lives that's what she said well then before she knew it the man that she thought would never cheat on her was sleeping with somebody else and he wanted a divorce and by this point he didn't even have the air to try to put into words why he was finished with this marriage and it wasn't until she kind of heard what I'm describing now that she she turned to him and said I understand now I can remember you telling me for years what you needed and I can remember deciding that you didn't really need it and I wasn't going to give it to you and I'm so sorry I didn't hear you now they ended up getting back together sometimes it's too late but if that's the situation then take a deep breath right look if it's the classic version of somebody cheating on you and they did it without conscience and they didn't confess it they were discovered and they've done it repeatedly and when they do it they blame you for it and it can be it can be a little bit similar to what I just described right when I say you catch them or or they confess but they blame you for it okay stop in and understand is it reasonable because there's a difference in the situation I was describing and somebody just saying something stupid like you know I'm I don't know you don't you don't make enough time for me even though even though I don't work at all and I don't want to take a job so you have to work 60 hours and now I'm going to complain that you don't make time for me that's not the same thing or somebody's saying I had to cheat on you because you don't make enough money that's not the same thing where I think I deserve better or I just have to follow my heart I really hate that one I just had to follow my heart what does that what does that mean that's not the same thing so identifying if you played a role in it can actually help you with forgiveness now if it's not one of those versions if it's a like I said if it's more the classic version of like they just cheated on me and I can't trust them then the truth is they get past it you need to have some kind of understanding if there is no understanding and you're trying to get past it you might be trying to get past it based on an addiction that you have for them there's not really a good plan to get past somebody repeatedly cheating on you because you're addicted to them as a matter of fact the best plan in that case well there's not really a good plan what I was about to say is go back to them because sometimes when they repeatedly cheat on you you can get numb to the fact that they eventually end up proving to you who they are so sometimes somebody has to go back to a habitual cheater time and time again even though consciously they know they shouldn't and they have their friends and their family telling them that they shouldn't do it sometimes you only know what you know when you know it in other words sometimes you have to get burned enough times that it can actually finally break that addiction and break that hold because they eventually succeed in convincing you that this isn't a misunderstanding this is just somebody who's not worthy of being trusted okay so having said all that some tips if you decide that you want to get back with the person who cheated on you well understanding first like one thing that can help is imagining all right it's really hard to imagine that I'm going to get back with somebody who just spent the last like week week sleeping with somebody and it could be somewhere between it could be like a week sleeping with somebody or maybe they spent the last year sleeping with somebody right that's really hard to live with but stop and ask yourself if it was hard for you to imagine them being intimate with somebody else for a week or a month or a year are you really gonna walk away forever because if you walk away forever they're going to sleep with somebody else forever you've lost them forever so I've talked to a lot of clients that will say I can't take it I can't take it I found out they slept with somebody else I've had clients that I I helped them get back the one they lost and then when they got them back they found out that while they were apart their ex slept with somebody else and when they found out they ruined the whole thing they lost their temper they said I can't do this and they walked out nine times out of ten that client's gonna call me back in a week and say can you help me get them back again I just spent the last week realizing that I can forgive them because I miss them so bad so take a deep breath before you say I can't get over it because you might say that intellectually but emotionally you might have just like committed yourself to years of Torment wondering and imagining that you had found found a way to get over it like if it hurts you that bad the think of them sleeping with them for a little bit think about what you're committing to when you walk away so considering the consequences can really help now let's say they come back and everything's understood but now you just need an actual plan to move forward they're sorry they're trustworthy you realize what you contributed to it or you didn't but now you're just trying to be two authentic good people trying to move forward and dealing with the past knowing there was somebody else so number one one of the things to realize well what do you do with that person in other words the third person the other person in the relationship the one that they cheated on you with because now there's three people in this relationship the first thing to address is that third person if it's a co-worker you need to quit if it's an old friend of the family they're no longer a friend and I'm just being honest but sometimes we have enlightened ourselves to the point of stupidity we've enlightened ourselves to a point that makes sense logically if we were kind of like living in a utopian world and we were all logical creatures but we're not logical creatures we're emotional and logical creatures so if you've been with somebody else and that person was a friend they can't be your friend anymore the first thing to do is that you get one message to tell the person that you've cheated with that there will be no other contact so the best thing to do is to let's say that I hate to use myself for an example because I'm not going to cheat on my wife but if my wife found out I cheated on her and she decided to forgive me and we were going to give it another try whoever that other person is I get one more message with that other person and it's not to pour my heart out and to tell them how much I'm going to miss them and how sorry I am it's really just to say I've decided to go back to my girlfriend I've decided to go back to my wife you won't be hearing from me anymore and please don't reach out to me please respect this decision and that's it now the person that you're coming back to should be able to read that message should be able to see you hit send should be able to see you hit send on your phone and should be able to see you block that number as as stupid as we've become with this idea that well you need to be secure you can't do that yeah you can basically it comes down to this you're gonna have to choose a person that you're going to hurt are you going to hurt the person that you already betrayed you're trying to convince you want to give it an authentic chance or you're going to hurt the person that you betrayed them with if you have to choose between hurting the one you cheated with and hurting the one you cheated on and you're trying to save that relationship you've got to choose to hurt the other person and that can be a big challenge that can be one of the biggest hurdles but that's the choice you have to make so if you say I just need time one of the biggest flaws is they'll say I'm going to break up with them but I just need a month I just need a couple of weeks I just need a few days if they're telling you that then it's not going to work you get one message to cut off that relationship and if you say well what if I work with them well then find another job look if you say well I can't find her in the job well I'm just telling you it's very unlikely if you keep that person in your life if the person who's trust you're trying to win back is going to be able to trust you and it has nothing to do with them being insecure it has to do with them not being a fool if you keep a relationship going let's say that I I cheat with somebody that I work with but then I say hey don't worry I'm not going to do it again well now that person has become has become forbidden guess what a huge magnifier of Attraction is a massive magnifier of Attraction is being forbidden and then being in their General presence consistently over and over again that'd be like saying you're an alcoholic but you work at a bar the chances of you overcoming being an alcoholic while you're working at the bar is close to zero and you're asking the person that you already betrayed to carry the weight of that every day how are they supposed to forgive you for the wound that you inflicted when every day you're inflicting a new one so you can't even if you don't work with them if they're just a friend they're not a friend anymore number two the person that you come back to they have full access to you for a while so don't preach this whole thing about well I have my rights no it's not a matter of you have your rights if you cheated on someone then you need to be able to let them see your phone like again putting myself in that situation God forbid if I cheated on my wife if I want her to know that I legitimately want to make this work one of the things I have to do is say all right I'm gonna I'm gonna send that message this relationship with the other person is over now anytime you want to check my phone you can anytime you want to call me unless you're calling me so much you're going to get me fired anytime you want to check on me unless you're checking on me so much you're going to get me fired or cause a humiliating scene or embarrass me the key word here is reasonable you want to do and this is what you want from the other person this is what you want to see from the person who cheated on you you want to see not only an agreement to these things you want to see an enthusiastic agreement because real regret means real remorse and real remorse is willing to earn back the trust that they lost so if you're telling the person you cheated on you these things then like I don't know about that I don't I don't think you need to see my phone I don't think you need to be calling me at work I don't think you need to be checking up on me well then they're probably lying and they're probably planning on cheating on you again because somebody authentically trying to win back your trust is going to look at every opportunity that you take to check their phone and to check their location they're going to look at it as a chance to prove to you that they're not cheating on you again if I'm the one in that situation and my wife called me and said can you take a picture of where you are right now I'm gonna say yeah absolutely honey hey I understand why you're asking why you're asking because if I were you I would be wondering so you want to like join with them in helping them know that they can trust you if she called me and said do you mind taking a picture of where you are just so I know that you're alone and I said well you don't need to do that why don't you just trust me what's an obvious answer why she doesn't just trust me I just cheated on her she says can you turn on your phone location and I go you know what I'm getting tired of you not getting over it this was one of my this is a giveaway line either you're going to trust me or you're not either you're going to forgive me or you're not when they're saying that anywhere close to the time that they cheated they're probably going to cheat on you again and they're using a maneuver to try to deflect it back onto you you're acting crazy you're acting untrustworthy you're responsible for breaking this relationship that's not true they should enthusiastically embrace the opportunity to prove to you that they're not still cheating on you so in the relationship give them open access to the phone give them open access to you Embrace every chance that they ask you to check on your location to check out your story and to make sure that you're telling them the truth after they know that you're not lying they'll stop asking but the more you're defensive and the more you're telling them what they have a right to do and what they have a right not to do the more they're going to have a difficult time trusting you so you have to step into it one of the other things is after an affair the person who was cheated on a lot of times will want to know details that you can't imagine they actually want to know like one of the ones that a lot of women will ask is was she good did you enjoy it what did you do what kind of sex did you do and they might ask you personal humiliating embarrassing questions that you can't you can't believe that they even want to know they're asking you those questions not because they actually want to torment themselves with the truth they're asking you those questions because they actually just want to know that whatever they ask you you'll tell them the truth normally once you answer enough questions to confirm that you're telling the truth they'll stop asking but a good thing to say when they're asking you any questions about that that other love affair is to tell them listen I'll be honest with you I'll tell you anything you want to know because I want you to trust me and you have a right to ask whatever you want to ask me but don't ask me anything think about what you're going to ask me first because I don't want you to ask me anything that you can't forget you might ask me something and because I'm I'm going to prove to you I'll tell you the truth I might tell you something that hurts you more but once I tell you I can't take it back you're always going to hear it and you're always going to know it so ask me the questions you need to so I can prove to you I'm not holding anything back but don't ask me something you're not going to be able to get over a lot of times once they know that that's what you're doing that you're willing to share everything they'll stop pushing and then just give each other time but it's actually good if you can to actually engage in being and being together like I know it sounds crazy but actually being intimate with each other when you both feel like you can and I don't mean feel completely happy and like now the memory of the past is out of your mind forever that's kind of that's kind of unrealistic but as soon as you can be together be together and then be together again like one of the things I've recommended is that a couple when they get back together have sex like once a day for 10 days again I know that's a little controversial but what I'm saying is I don't mean do it when you just can't when your eyes are just you know when you every time you close your eyes you imagine them being with somebody else I don't mean that but surprisingly more than people would expect fact once the person who cheated on you comes back a lot of times you're going to feel relief you're actually going to feel a willingness to be intimate with them because you're glad to have them back even if you didn't expect to have that reaction if that's your reaction don't fight it don't fight it just until you know that you know that you know that you can trust them because sex can actually be a really bonding thing I'm trying to be careful how I say this I'm not saying have sex even if you don't feel trust I don't want you to have sex while you're crying trying to do whatever you can to make the the relationship work again I don't mean that what I mean is when they come back even if they've been with somebody else a lot of times you'll find a natural attraction that's there that sometimes people try to suppress and fight off because they feel like it's going to sabotage this relationship attempt again it doesn't if it it can it can help the relationship so sometimes that one is a little bit dependent on the situation but I hope that makes sense