Adult Situations

This article was written by Danielle

I often get emails from wives who have become absolutely obsessed with the woman who their husbands had an affair with. They want to know every single thing about this woman and no detail is too small. What does she look like? Why did she have this power over your husband? What did they do together? Is she better than you in some way?

The other day, a woman wrote to me and said something like “I can’t help it. I need to see this other woman. And once I see what she looks like, I may even decide to talk to her because I have to know what she had that I didn’t and why he was attracted to her.” I understand this need. You want to size her up and see just what and who you are dealing with. But, I can also tell you from experience that seeing her is going to put an image in your head that is very hard, (if not impossible) to erase. And this image (and overcoming it) can hold just as much negative power over you as wanting to see her can. I’ll explain this more in the following article.

What You’re Hoping To Accomplish By Seeing The Other Woman: Forgive me if I am making assumptions or are speaking for you. But, I believe I know what you’re hoping to get out of seeing her. You want to take some of the mystery out of this whole process. You want reassurance that she isn’t prettier or better than you and you’re probably hoping that she’s fat or ugly. You fantasize about confronting her or scaring her off. You want to see guilt and shame in her eyes. You’re hoping that by looking at her and sizing her up, you’ll understand just what your husband was going for or trying to accomplish.

I can tell you from experience that you’ll often have a very strong reaction if you do see her. Many times, it is not what you were hoping for. Many women tell me things like “I was honestly disappointed. She’s not even pretty. I look better than her, so I just don’t get or understand it.” And many times the wife is left frustrated because she really didn’t get the information out of this that she had hoped.

Or, other times the wives will say something like “what an old idiot my husband is. This woman is young enough to be his daughter,” or “she is a cheap looking beach blond bimbo and he should be so embarrassed that he fell for this. In fact, I’m embarrassed for him.” Again, this elicits strong, negative feelings. It’s very rare that I have a woman come back and tell me that she had a neutral reaction or that she got what she wanted from putting a face with her perception. Usually, this only brings about more questions and more frustration.

Deciding Whether You Should Try To See The Other Woman Or Not: You may have guessed this already, but I honestly think that you shouldn’t go out of your way to see her. I believe that this gives her more power over you and gives her a more prominent place in your life than she deserves. You really aren’t likely to get the answers that you really want or are looking for from her. And, this will just give you more troublesome mental images to dwell on or to eventually have to over come.

In all honestly, healing yourself and your marriage is up to you and your husband. No third parties have any place in this process. The best case scenario is for you and your husband to cease all contact with her and move on – focusing only on the two of you. Yes, for a while you are most definitely going to wonder about her. But eventually, when your marriage is much stronger and you have no doubt that you are who your husband wants, she will not have a prominent place in your mind anymore and you should start this process as soon as you can.

If you must see her, do so quickly. Don’t dwell and don’t approach her. Don’t follow her long term or allow this to become a habit. Take a quick look so that the mystery is gone, but know that trying to figure her out or what your husband saw in her is really a waste of time and will very likely delay your healing. Even your husband probably doesn’t fully understand why he cheated with this woman. To be quite honest, the answer is usually that your husband was feeling bad about himself, or was vulnerable, and this is the woman who happened to be there. It doesn’t mean that there’s anything special about her or that she has some untouchable intangible quality that you don’t have. It simply means that she was in the right place at an inopportune time.

Trying to get to the core of why this happened doesn’t mean deciphering her. It makes having honest discussions with your husband and examining where he and the marriage was vulnerable and where it can be fixed and strengthened. She should have no part of this process.

I know that even contemplating your husband’s “other woman” is painful and difficult, but make sure that you don’t give her more power than she deserves. And, healing is often closer than you may think. It took a lot of work and patience, but today my marriage is actually stronger than it ever was before. I also did a lot of work on myself and am happier as the result. Our bond and intimacy is much stronger and my self esteem is at an all time high. I know longer worry my husband will cheat again. You can read my very personal story on my blog.