In the wake of an affair, depression is everywhere. It’s in the betrayed spouse who can’t get out of bed. It’s in the unfaithful partner who can’t explain why they blew up their life. And it’s often in the space between them—thick, invisible, and unnamed.
Here’s the thing most people miss: depression isn’t always the result of betrayal. Sometimes, it’s the setup.
Infidelity isn’t always about sex. Marital infidelity isn’t always about falling in love with someone else. Sometimes it’s about escape. Sometimes it’s about belief. And sometimes, it’s about a system that broke down long before anyone noticed it was cracking.
In most cases, affairs fall into one of three buckets:
Why did they do it?” is a question I’m asked all the time.
Clients and those in our affair recovery programs ask because they need the world to make sense again.
They’re trying to rebuild some version of reality that you can live with. And at the center of it is that question—not just about what happened, but about who they are, who their spouse is, and whether the life they built with their spouse ever really existed in the first place.
That is the number one question I hear most often repeated from the person who has been betrayed. Sometimes the wayward partner is even asking that question., “Why did I cheat?”
I have a very distinct memory the first time I saw a couple in this situation because it really stands out in my mind. The husband had been betrayed and he was ready to file divorce papers. He was animated and upset, he had no peace. He wasn’t sleeping, not really eating, and had lost all joy in life.
To make matters worse…