Infidelity Revenge - Should you get even?Infidelity revenge is frequently contemplated when someone has been cheated on by their spouse. I succumbed to this basic instinct on several occasions. I was harmed by my desire to get even with my husband and his lover. Infidelity revenge can take over your life and delays the real work involved in recovering from the trauma you just suffered. I didn’t get any relief from getting back at them. So, even though it is difficult to do, I strongly suggest that you not attempt to get even with your spouse or even try to contact his lover. No good can come from any of it. In seeking infidelity revenge, I tried desperately to break my husband and his lover up. I sent her a letter about my spouses shortcomings and warned her what her life would be like in five years if they were to stay together. I would not resist his sexual advances when he would come over and told her on several occasions that he was cheating on her with me. I tried to get her to leave town, even pleaded with her to leave (she was only in town for six months for a short term work assignment). I threatened to send the emails she had sent to my husband to her parents. Her parents thought she was a virgin and thought that the man she was dating was divorced with children. She is Mormon and it is taboo for her to be involved in a sexual relationship outside of marriage let alone an adulterous one. She ended up telling her parents that she had sex with him (before I could) and her mother cried. She couldn’t tell her mother that her boyfriend was married as she figured it would devastate her. When I, again, threatened to tell her parents everything I knew, she threatened back that she would never leave if I did. Infidelity revenge wasn't as satisfying as I thought it would be. The harder I tried to split them up, the more it backfired on me. He would get upset at me each time I contacted her and it would just serve to bring them closer together. I would hurt her feelings and she would run to his arms. If I said something to her on the phone, she would twist it around and tell him some convoluted version of it. Of course, he believed his sweet innocent lover over me. She had him wrapped around her finger. When I finally came to the realization that I could never win this battle, I gave up trying. I was tired of fighting and I decided it was time to move on with my life and take care of myself. I didn’t contact him unless I needed his help with the kids. I didn’t sleep with him (she had moved in with him temporarily). I didn’t make plans around him. I did whatever I wanted to do whenever I wanted to do it. I think it was hard for him to see me living my life and having fun without him. I stopped meddling in their relationship and stopped talking about her. This was the ultimate infidelity revenge! He saw that my life no longer revolved around him. In March, she took a three month assignment out of state (he was going to see if he and I could work things out while she was gone). After she left, I told him that I wanted him to come back and left it at that. He had a hard time understanding why after everything that I had been through that I would still want him back. He still had reservations about whether we could work things out and he said we would just see how things went. He would come over several times a week to visit with the “kids”. I would be surprised that he would spend most of the time with me. He would want to take the kids to the movies on Friday evenings and wanted me to go also. He started spending 2-3 nights per week over at my house. Six weeks after his lover left, my father came to stay with me to recover from a severe leg fracture. He had other medical problems and some underlying confusion. My husband went with me to pick my dad up and stayed over to help me with him. I did not ask for the help, he just volunteered. With the exception of one night several weeks later, he has spent every single night at our home. The day before Mother’s Day he told me that he wanted to be married to me and that he wanted us to work things out. He asked for me to be patient with him as he did not want to jump back into things too quickly and get hurt again. He apologized for everything that had happened. I received an email from my husband’s former lover several weeks after she moved away. She was very apologetic for all the trauma she had caused me, my husband, and our kids. I hadn’t communicated with her for at least two months. I was surprised that she sent it to me. I could tell from the tone of it that she was very sorry and regretful for having gotten involved with him in the first place. He led her to believe that our relationship was over a longtime before she came into the picture and she believed him. Once they were separated by 200 miles, they were finally able to take a fresh look at their relationship and see it for what it was "an affair". Infidelity revenge can also be carried out by the faithful spouse going out and sleeping with someone else. This type of revenge is not safe and will not help your situation. Infidelity is wrong, period! It doesn't matter who commits it or why. As you can see by my poor example, infidelity revenge or retaliation is not the answer when faced with your partners infidelity. It creates a hostile environment in which no one wins. It will invariably backfire on you and will not make the other person feel guilty for what they have done to you. In fact, they may come to believe that you deserved what you got. When you stop fighting and live your life on your terms, you can find happiness and peace (even if your spouse doesn’t return).
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