Marriages fall apart for many different reasons. However, one of the most common reasons is a cheating spouse.

Discovering that your spouse has been cheating on you can be one of the hardest situations to handle; it’s the ultimate betrayal.

You’re likely to feel angry, shocked and understandably hurt. However, you have to handle all this wisely.

In this article,  a marriage counselor offers you a piece of advice on how to handle such painful situation.

Effective communication

The first thing to do is to move in the direction of connection, communication, and care. Then, you can consider what the best path might be in order to find the best resolution. 

If you make your decisions while you are feeling angry, hurt and emotional, your decisions may neither be in your own best interest nor of the children.

Don’t use the divorce as a weapon

Using divorce as a weapon does not help. The reason is because if you want to achieve a sense of inner peace and an amicable solution to the difficulties that you are experiencing with your spouse, then the focus needs to be on effective communication.

Forgiveness

It is important for you to ask yourself whether you think you can truly forgive your spouse and move forward with your marriage or not.

Be honest

After having the opportunity to step back and analyze your situation, your next step is to decide whether you can tolerate living with those conditions without becoming vulnerable to anger and rage. 

Naturally, it would be very difficult. BUT you have to be honest with yourself.

If you cannot tolerate that kind of situation, and you doubt your spouse’s sincerity and ability to remain chaste, you may want to seek legal counseling to find out what your rights are and what steps to take.

Marital counseling

A marriage counselor can help you both move through the process of healing as well as giving points and advice on communication, reviving romance, forgiving, and learning to trust again.

Individual counseling

Individual counseling will help you to work through your emotions, to think clearly and make wise decisions about the steps that you will want to take to ensure that you maintain a good relationship with your children and that your interests are fairly protected. 

If you are not sure about your feelings and what you want, counseling will help you to clarify them.

Make your decision

Trust can be built up again, but it will take time and a lot of work from your spouse.

If you feel that you can no longer trust him, cannot forgive him and will hold this grudge against him, which will cause more hurt, then you may need to consider separation, knowing that separation will also be a difficult experience.

Pray the istikharah prayer, and ask Allah (SWT) to facilitate what is best for you.

We are human

Remember that we are all humans and prone to making mistakes. What’s important is that we repent and ask Allah to forgive us, stop the sin, vow not to do it again and if it involves hurting someone else, seek their forgiveness.

If it is not possible, then at least make du’aa’ for them.

This article is from our archive, originally published on an earlier date and highlighted here for its importance.