If Elizabeth Edwards Is Staying, Should You Too?

    Elizabeth Edwards spoke with Oprah Winfrey about her husbands infidelity.  Oprah asked, "Is it a day by day thing?" and Edwards responded with, "Neither one of us is out the door so I guess it's day by day, but maybe it's month by month."
d360: Edwards, I Cheated

On August, 28, 2007, the public watched a shell shocked Suzanne Craig stand by her husband, Idaho Senator Larry Craig, as he vigorously denied soliciting gay sex in a public bathroom at the Minneapolis airport. According to Fox News Reports, Suzanne Craig said that when her husband told her the story was about to break, "I felt like the floor was falling out from under me. And I felt almost like I was going down a drain for a few moments."      

 Discovering a spouse has been unfaithful can be traumatic. Not only is an affair a betrayal of past promises, it’s a threat against the future of a marriage. If the affair is made public, responding is even more difficult. The humiliation increases if you criticize someone else's decision about sticking with an unfaithful spouse and then find yourself dealing with your own.

 In 2000, Wendy Vitter suggested Hillary Clinton should have divorced former President Bill Clinton over his escapades with intern Monica Lewinksy. Then her husband, Louisiana Sen. David Vitter, admitted he'd used an escort service. According to Fox News, she chose to forgive him: "I made the decision to love him and to recommit to our marriage. To forgive is not always the easy choice, but it was and is the right choice for me," she said.        

Most betrayed spouses don’t have to play out their agony in the press. But, sometimes, when family or friends find out a loved one has been cheated on, they press the betrayed spouse to immediately make the decision about whether they're going to stay in the marriage. However, therapists caution wounded parties against making life changing decisions at a time when they’re in emotional shock.

“The discovery of infidelity is devastating because it shatters basic assumptions about the security we expect in committed relationships,” wrote the late Dr. Shirley Glass, author of “NOT Just Friends: Protect Your Relationship from Infidelity and Heal the Trauma of Betrayal.” Dr. Glass, who was known as "the godmother of infidelity research," compared the emotional shock of discovery of an affair to the trauma experienced by those who have gone through horrific events.

She made an impact among marriage therapists by saying that betrayed partners in adulterous affairs often suffered from post-traumatic stress similar to that experienced by combat veterans. So, give yourself time to regain your equilibrium and then sort through your options because this is a decision with many ramifications.


A PATTERN OF BEHAVIOR?

Part of sorting through is finding out about the incident -- and whether it was a one-time incident or a pattern. “When I hear of multiple affairs, I know I’m dealing with a Don Juan who hasn't quite come out,” said Dr. Don-David Lusterman, author of “Infidelity: A Survivor’s Guide.” “He may be a married man who loves the wife, the kids, and the dog. But, while he’s filling up his inner emptiness with what he calls a victimless crime, he may also be exposing his wife to sexually transmitted diseases.”         

“When the wife finds out what’s going on, she’s enraged, hurt and angry. She needs to tell him, ‘I don't want to have any dealings with you until you figure out whether you can whip this.’ If the husband is sure he doesn't want a divorce, he can begin to change. Otherwise, he’ll continue having affairs. It’s a very sad thing to work with people who are so empty and don't even know it.”        

Whatever the reason for the affair(s), there are many things to consider when making a decision about staying in a marriage or getting divorced. How will the decision affect the children? How will it affect a business owned by the couple? How will it affect economic stability? This is an especially important consideration for wives who’ve followed a more traditional stay-at-home role. Moreover, for many betrayed spouses, the possibility of contracting an STD, especially HIV/AIDS, from an unfaithful partner is an important consideration in their decision of whether to throw in the towel or pick up the pieces.