Beyond Betrayal: Untangling the Post-Infidelity Trauma Loop

Betrayal by a loved one–especially sexual infidelity–can be one of the most traumatic events a person experiences. And if you’ve been betrayed by a romantic partner, you know firsthand how devastating the blow can be. In fact, those who are betrayed often find themselves drowning in a sea of endless questions, overwhelming anxiety, and doubt. Despite the trauma they’ve endured, the betrayed individual often feels pressured to accept a partner’s apology, invest in the relationship, and move on. But what if true recovery requires–first and foremost–rebuilding of the self? Today, we’re joined by a renowned betrayal trauma specialist and author, Beth Fischer, who is the creator of The Betrayal Trauma Healing Method and The Integrity Journey. Beth will guide us into the art of healing from the deep pain of betrayal.

Topics discussed include sexual betrayal, emotional betrayal, financial betrayal, infidelity, loss, grief, pain, trauma, PTSD, shame, marriage, relationship\s, intimacy, trust, self-trust, nervous system, dysregulation, betrayer, betrayed, marriage therapy, relationship therapy, individual therapy, healing, divorce, and self-work.

Please note that this episode contains sensitive material; listener discretion is advised.

Emergency Assistance Details: If you or someone you know needs immediate support, please call your emergency services. In the US, 24/7 help is available by calling “911,” “988” (Suicide and Crisis Hotline), or SAMSA (Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration) at 1-800-662-HELP (4357). As applicable, additional resources may be provided in the show notes.

Non-Emergency Online Mental Health Information: https://www.nami.org/support-education/nami-helpline/

and https://odphp.health.gov/myhealthfinder/healthy-living/mental-health-and-relationships

IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: No expert is offering medical or psychological direction or advice; the content is purely informational in nature. Please consult your physician or healthcare provider before undertaking any new regimen or procedure.

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Beyond Betrayal: Untangling the Post-Infidelity Trauma Loop

Betrayal by a loved one, especially sexual infidelity can be one of the most traumatic events a person ever experiences. If you’ve been betrayed by a romantic partner, you know firsthand how devastating the blow can be. In fact, those who are betrayed often find themselves swimming in a sea of endless questions, overwhelming anxiety and doubt. Yet despite the trauma they’ve endured, the betrayed individual often feels pressured to accept a partner’s apology, invest in the relationship and then move on.

What if true deeper recovery requires, first and foremost, rebuilding of the self? In this episode, we’re joined by an amazing betrayal expert who will guide us into the art of healing from infidelity. Also, we’ll focus on this list of nurse real-life questions. “My husband cheated on me with someone in our social circle. I found out by chance, not because he told me, but through a friend. At first, he denied it, but when I didn’t let it go, he finally admitted to it.”

“He said it was a one-off thing and that he’d never cheat on me again but I can’t move on. Now I don’t trust him. I’m always worried he’ll cheat again and I don’t know how many times he might have cheated in the past. We have two teenage kids. I don’t know if to stay or go. Please help.” With that very poignant issue, as the focus of our episode. I’m Dr. Carla Marie Manly, and this is imperfect Love. Please note as this episode contains sensitive information. Listener discretion is advised.

We are joined by Beth Fisher. Beth is an Author, a Betrayal Trauma Specialist, Creator of the Betrayal Trauma Healing Method, and the Integrity Journey. Welcome to the show, Beth. I’m so excited to have you with us.

Dr. Carla, you have no idea. Thank you so much for having me. It’s quite an honor to meet you. I must say that.

Thank you. It’s such a pleasure and a joy to meet you. I’m so excited to share your important work with our readers because when we have, say a car accident, or somebody robs a home. There’s so much support for the person. When somebody is betrayed, we’ll just limit our conversation. There are many ways people can be betrayed, but we’re talking here about sexual infidelity.

In that case, emotional infidelity is bad enough. It’s painful but sexual infidelity can blow somebody out of the water because it is a deep trauma that is often not understood, appreciated or supported in a deep way. Before we draw into your area of your specialty. Could you tell our readers just a little bit about what makes you, you?

I am a teacher at heart. When I graduated from college, that was my profession. I spent fifteen years in a classroom and in a principal’s office. Teaching has always just been a part of me. I’ve always wanted to learn. I’m a lifelong learner and I’ve always wanted to give that learning to others. What’s so fascinating is that I left the educational world to be an entrepreneur of a completely different business unrelated to education.

The betrayal that happened within my own marriage brought me right back where I needed to be, which is education again. Although, I’m not teaching Junior High Science and Math like I used to. I’m teaching people about betrayal, trauma and how to heal from it because there’s too much misinformation out there. At my heart, I’m an educator and I get to do it again and I loved it. I loved being back in that saddle.

We have many similarities, and one of them is a former career as a teacher. The other one is the lifelong love of learning and more beyond that but we’ll just stay right here. I appreciate that you shared your personal wound around betrayal because I firmly believe that when we have a physical experience and then heal from it and do the work. That can help us be incredible teachers and healers when we become the wounded healer.

We worked on the wound, so we know it from personal experience. I’m not saying that if you have a psychotherapist who hasn’t experienced trauma or deep wounding, that they’re not going to be wonderful. I’m saying that sometimes that deep lived experience adds an edge of connection that can be powerful. When we look at the reader’s question, we’ll start there. Take a first swipe at this important question and the pain that I can feel in the question. What would you say?

You can't heal from the same version of the person who hurt you. Your partner must become a 2.0 version of themselves to rebuild trust. Share on X

I’ve been there and I asked that same question when I was going through this as a betrayed wife. Her last question, I want to answer first, if that’s okay. Which was, “I don’t know if I should stay or go.” This is what I tell betrayed partners right off the bat. Unless there’s abuse or something outlined that needs to be addressed. It’s too soon to make that decision. When betrayed partners find out about that betrayal, they’re in survival mode.

Why Staying Isn’t Always the Answer

They’re nervous system is completely dysregulated. There’s no safety anywhere. When they’re making this monumental decision of, “Should I stay or should I go?” It’s coming from, as I described it, in a place of pain. I want to help the betrayed partners get to a place of what I call pain to power. I want them to make that decision from a more powerful place. What do I mean by power? Healed, finding that confidence and building back up that self-esteem which takes such a hit when you find out that you’ve been the victim of a betrayal.

I want betrayed partners to become independently healthy, as we call it. When that betrayed partner becomes independently healthy, the decision to stay or go becomes pretty clear. They’re not making it from pain and fear. They’re making it from confidence. For this case, what I would say to her right off the bat is, unless there’s some other reason I want you to slow down. I want you to take care of you, first and foremost. Let’s get you on the right healing path. I know Dr. Carla will be talking about what that path looks like. When they’re on that path, the decision becomes much easier.

You’ve laid it out so beautifully and it’s the same with truly any form of trauma and any form of relational pain. That when we come from a reactionary place, like, “Let me get out of here. I hate this person so much, or whatever it might be.” If we’re coming from that place as you say, we’re coming from a place of pain or fear. We’re coming from fight, flight, freeze and appeasement. It’s one of those responses. The big work is doing the healing, as you say. Investing and rebuilding the self. Emotional regulation.

All of those key components. First, to get there, one must be able to accept or appreciate, if in fact, they have been traumatized. Some people find out that a partner cheated on them, and they’ve been so detached from the relationship. They’re like, “Whatever. I’ve cheated on them also, or I don’t care. I don’t sleep with them anyway, or love them that much any way.” For other people, I noticed that it becomes this idea of getting revenge. It’s like, “I’m going to pay that person back. I’m going to make them buy me gifts. I’m going to make them growl. I’m going to do this. I’m going to do that,” and that’s not necessarily a very healthy place.

We’re coming from a place of room vengeance. I don’t think that’s right. It may feel good at the moment. It might be that sense of an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. Some people believe in that, but on a soul level, on a spiritual level, on a self-growth level, that’s a hard place to be coming from. I’m not judging. I’m just saying, it’s one to start looking if you’re coming from a reactive place rather than a place of, “This is a big shock to my body, mind, and spirit. Let me just slow down.”

Back to you, Beth. Let’s move to another part. Thank you for setting the stage with, “It makes sense that you feel like, should I stay or should I go?” The other thing that a lot of people, when I work with someone who’s been portrayed, are like, “I’m stupid if I stay.” Please answer that one. That often comes up like a strong woman would pack her bags or a strong man, because women cheat on men. A strong person would pack their bags or throw the other person’s backs on the lawn. What do you say when that comes up?

Defining Strength in Trauma Recovery

It’s not about strength and weakness. It isn’t, because I’ve had people who have said, “I was strong because I stayed. There’s other people who will say exactly what you just said, “This person is strong because they left.” In my orbit, anyway, we don’t like to use terms like strength and weakness. We want to use terms healthy and unhealthy. Call me dysregulated. That’s the language that we come at this.

It’s a very trauma-informed language. A betrayed partner can be strong if he or she stays and a betrayed partner can be strong if he or she leaves. It’s both. It’s not staying is one and leaving is the other. It all depends. If we’re talking about that big decision, should I stay or should I go? A lot of that is going to depend on what the partner, the betrayer is or is not doing.

I could stay but if my partner is not doing the work, then I’m going to have to live this pretend normal life. That’s not healthy. If I choose to leave, but I don’t heal the wounds that were left, then I go into another relationship. Lo and behold, there’s another betrayal in that relationship. Again, there’s so many scenarios but we want people to make the best decisions from the healthiest place possible. One person’s strength could be another person’s weakness and vice versa.

I like how you go from the dichotomous thinking of the right, wrong, strong, or weak, and take it to the place of a very personal process. For somebody, where it’s been a slowly devolved relationship or a relationship is slowly devolved over time. They wake up and they find out, which doesn’t sound like this is the case with this person. They realize, “This partner has been cheating on me all along. This is the last straw.” They’re like, “This is a message that I am done,” and they’re able to move from a place of calm strength and insight.

They might have needed that last nudge for whatever reason. When you feel the deep pain and confusion inside yourself. We can sense it in the reader’s question. It’s like, “I have two teenage kids but what do I do? I’m living.” What you’re talking about with emotional dysregulation. It’s what she’s describing. She is saying, “I’m constantly worried. I’m constantly in fear,” and that hyper vigilance state is certainly not good for her psychologically or physically.

That’s right. I’ll jump in just for a second just to let her know what’s happened. One of the differentiators, for me, is that I studied so much Neuroscience about how the brain, how the nervous system works and how they complement each other. What’s happening with this betrayed partner, her brain is trying to process this information. You said something in your opening, Dr. Carla, that I appreciated so much. Betrayal trauma is one of the most dramatic events that an adult can experience. The reason is that the past changes.

When we think about traumatic events, you named a couple earlier. We think about a car accident, or the unexpected death of a loved one. We can think about all of these terrible things that can happen to us as adults. In all of those scenarios, your past remains intact. When we talk about the unexpected death of a loved one, every day going forward is forever going to be different because that person is no longer here but the past is intact.

Why the Past Changes During Betrayal

The person that’s grieving can still look at pictures, watch videos and have happy memories and can have conversations with others who knew the one that passed and have good memories. When we’re talking about betrayal trauma, discovering a betrayal, the past changes now. Who I thought I was, who I thought my partner was, what I thought my life was, is now gone. That’s one of the reasons that betrayed partners will get stuck trying to understand what happened. That’s why they become hyper vigilant.

Betrayal trauma is unique because the past changes. Who you thought you were and who your partner was is gone, creating a new reality to navigate. Share on X

We call it going into detective mode, where they just want to keep digging and digging and asking more questions. Their brain is trying to process the fact that their past is no longer what they thought it was. It’s a very normal process that betrayed partners go through. When I say normal, I always back that up with normal does not always mean healthy. A betrayed partner can get stuck in what call survival mode. It’s one of the stages that betrayed partners go through. They’re stuck in this survival mode.

The triggers don’t stop. The movies in their mind keep playing. The thoughts keep going over and over again. They’ve got those physical symptoms. Their hearts will race. Some of them will have absolute panic attacks whenever they think about it. All of that is a stage. It’s all part of what we call survival mode. Only because it’s normal, it doesn’t mean that it’s healthy. We want to help betrayed partners get out of that stage and move into stage four. Which is when they start focusing on their own healing and they stop worrying about what the other person is or isn’t doing.

Thank you so much for slowing that down, Beth, so beautifully and making it so that readers can understand. I work with this issue probably at least once a week with somebody who’s been betrayed. The patterns are there and people feel so broken. They’re saying, “Why can’t I press pause? Why can I not do this?” I think of the times in my life when I’ve been deeply betrayed and it is not an on-off button. Especially if you’re a feeling person.

If you’re somebody who’s good at compartmentalizing, which I am not necessarily a fan of, and those people in strange ways, but I don’t want to be one of them. I would rather feel deeply, but there is that part where betrayal can trigger as you’re saying, those loops and then you end up feeling like you’re crazy. You’re crazy and the other person, usually, the betrayer is moving on with their life. They don’t care. They’re unaffected. They’re pretty fine.

In your world, as you are saying, readers, if this has happened to you, as Beth is so wisely saying, it is normal. It doesn’t mean it’s healthy because you are in those thought loops and you’re in a place of self-torture. The other person is only a matter what they’re doing but they’re generally feeling pretty much and then you are stuck in this survival mode where you are reliving. Sometimes, it’s the old HEBs law of neurons that fire together wire together.

The more you think about it, you unconsciously hard-wire in those images. I have a question for you, Beth. I know I wire images into my brain. My brain is very active. I like photographs. It takes pictures. I know many clients where that happens too to a very particular type of memory. I’m thinking with this individual who wrote in that it sounds like when they’re talking about it.

Maybe they have gotten into this stuck place where they can’t trust. They can’t stop thinking about it. It sounds as if maybe she is in that place where you’re saying, “It’s normal but not healthy.” What would you encourage her to do? A few basic steps. How can she press pause or turn down the volume without compartmentalizing?

It’s a little complicated. I’m probably going to spend a couple extra minutes on it if that’s okay.

Thank you, please. This is where it gets intricate, so please get as detailed as it feels right to you.

This particular question that came in. We’re talking about a reconciliation potential. You gave me a beautiful segue because the unfaithful partner, the betrayer of the relationship, a lot of times, once that secret gets out, they feel better because they’re not living in the shame of it anymore. Shane thrives in the dark. Once it hits the light, that shame can go away. It’s going to come back, so bear with me. In that moment, they feel a sense of relief in their nervous system because they’re not holding that secret anymore.

When you mentioned that the betrayed partners get stuck, the unfaithful partners are moving on. A lot of times, they’re moving on in a much better space because they’re not harboring that secret anymore. Now, for a reconciliation to happen, this is what I want betrayed partners to know. You cannot reconcile with the same version of your partner as the partner that hurt you. I’ll say it again in a different way.

The Difference Between 1.0 and 2.0 Versions

You cannot heal from the same version of the person that hurt you. What do I mean by that? I’m going to give you the end of the story first. My husband, when all of this came out, he became what I call a 2.0 version of himself, independently healthy. If I would have just stayed in my marriage and he was just moving on already, he told me, “I wish I had a dollar for every time he told me that I needed to just forget about it and move on.” I was the one keeping us stuck.

What’s interesting is that as soon as the betrayer is found out, the betrayed partner’s brain tags that person as a threat because they are now. They have now heard the betrayed partners so deeply. In this case, this is a betrayed woman, so we’re talking about an unfaithful man in this example. I’m just going to stick with that, to keep it easier.

Understanding the Brain’s Tagging Mechanism

Her brain has now tagged her husband as a threat. She can’t reconcile with a threat. It’s not possible. The brain and the nervous system won’t allow it. Her nervous system is going to constantly be saying, “He’s dangerous. You need to look at his phone. Look at his location. Check his emails.” If we’re going to have a marriage on the other side of a betrayal, the unfaithful partner has to become a new version of themselves. A version that the nervous system of the betrayed partner can trust.

That’s the work that we do with unfaithful partners. We help them go from the version of themselves that did this to the 2.0 version of themselves that would never do this again. Now, that takes time. There’s a lot of one-to-one therapy that needs to happen so that we can uncover the deeper reasons why they chose to do whatever it is that they did. For the audience, about speaking more from the perspective of the betrayed partner.

I want them to understand that, this person that wrote that question in, her husband hasn’t changed. Maybe he stopped acting out. Maybe he’s saying, “I’m sorry,” but guess what. Dr. Carla? That’s just becoming a better spouse. That’s not transforming into a 2.0 version of himself. He has to do much deeper work to uncover why this happened, and how this happened so that he can be a version of himself that the betrayed partners’ nervous system doesn’t tag as a threat.

It makes perfect sense and said so eloquently. You’re making me think in different terms. It’s much like if a neighbor’s dog bit you and the neighbor says, “Watch my dog for me. It’s okay to pet my dog.” Whatever she’s saying, that dog bit me and your nervous system is saying, “Dogs a thread. The dog bit you.” You look at the scars on your hand. At least in that case, you have the scars on your hand as a reminder.

Yet here you are living with someone where there’s no scars on your hand. They’re just all over your internal being. You’re the nervous system, that part of your body, you are an emotional being, your heart, and your soul. Maybe if the neighbor’s dog went to training school and underwent this intensive special training process, we might be able to approach the dog. You’d still be weary yet because your nervous system has to experience over a period of time that the dog has changed.

There are certain people who are never going to be able to pet that dog no matter how much training that dog has been through. We take it back to the relationship and look at it in human-to-human terms. Once someone has betrayed you and as you say, wisely. If they do the deep work, if they change and become a better version and show day after day consistently that they have been through a revamping process.

That’s to understand what led them to betray. Do they understand their commitment to the relationship, their commitment to themselves? If their core values are to be faithful, then all of that needs to become part of that reconnection rather than. “Get over it and move on. I’ve explained to you what happened. I bought you roses or whatever the thing is.” No. I so appreciate how you’re emphasizing that on a trauma healing level, when someone particularly a trusted romantic partner, is now tagged by the brain as a threat. Your life changes.

Home no longer feels safe. The bed no longer feels safe. The kitchen no longer feels safe. There’s no one where that feels safe. Please take it from there, Beth, because you’re offering such great information for our readers to understand that if you’re in this place or have been in this place, you’re not alone and it is a difficult place to be.

The Three Pillars of True Disclosure

Normally what will happen after I talk to people about the brain, tagging and the unfaithful partner has to go from 1.0 to 2.0. People will ask me, “What does that look like?” I coined the three pillars. For the unfaithful partner, this should happen whether or not there’s reconciliation but they have to do three things. They have to do the what, the why and the how. I try to keep things very simple for people. I’ll talk briefly about each of those.

What is the full disclosure? Too many times, the unfaithful partner will just say, “I cheated on you with her a year ago and never saw her again.” people will think that’s a full disclosure. It’s not. It’s not a full disclosure. When we’re working with unfaithful partners, we want them to do a true full therapeutic disclosure. There’s a lot more than just, “I had an affair a year ago and never saw her again or I never saw him again.” What is very important. That full disclosure.

The second piece is the why. What do betrayed partners ask all the time? It’s, “Why did you do this to me? Why did you do this to us? Why did you do this?” They need to be able to answer that question. Why, most of the time, the unfaithful partners will use the relationship as what I call a surface excuse for why they had an affair or whatever it was. It is not the core reason. Every marriage has issues. Why? It’s because there’s not a perfect human being out there. There is no perfect marriage.

When people say things like, “We didn’t have a good marriage. We had a bad marriage.” That’s the symptom of a bigger disease, though. That’s a symptom of a deeper problem. The bad marriage didn’t cause cheating. The lack of sex didn’t cause somebody to cheat. Did they contribute? Probably, but those are on the surface. The core why has to be much deeper than that. I’m going to blow people’s minds now because in my world, the core why has the answer to that question before the couple even met.

If your partner has betrayed you, your brain has tagged them as a threat. You can't reconcile with a threat. They must change to be safe. Share on X

Please keep going.

Before they even met because there’s something deeper going on. There’s probably emotional suppression, lack of empathy, very poor communication skills, or some narcissistic traits going on. There can be a myriad of issues that the person has been. I call it they’ve been carrying in their backpack their whole lives. Their emotional backpack. We help them uncover the root causes that led them on the path to being a betrayer in a romantic relationship. It’s not about sex, midlife crisis or bad marriage. It’s not about any of those things. There’s something much deeper, so that’s the why.

The third piece is the how. “How could you do this to me,” every betrayed partner says. I said it I don’t know how many times to my husband. “How could you do this to us, to our family and to our kids? How?” f the betrayed partners asking the question, then we need to be able to give them an answer. We work with unfaithful partners to help them figure out what is there how. I’m going to go back to the neuroscience, Dr. Carla.

The brain always wants us to be the good guy in our own story. I call it the Play-Doh affect. The brain will Play-Doh the partner. If I’m the unfaithful partner, I’m going to start looking at my spouse differently. I’m going to start saying things like, “My spouse never listens to me. My husband never pays attention to me. My wife never wants to have sex with me.” These are all these little phrases that the brain starts putting little hooks in to.

When that happens for a long enough period of time, the brain can justify anything. The brain can say, “My wife doesn’t even love me. I’m going to go have an affair or my husband doesn’t love me. This person does.” We help the unfaithful partners untangle this web of how, which is how their brain justified their choices. That’s the three pillars that when betrayed partners say, “What should my spouse be doing?” They need to be doing their full disclosure, the what. They need to be getting to the root cause which is the why, and then they have to untangle the patterns, the thoughts, the justifications that they use in their own brain to make this okay.

If they do that deeper work, now they’re going to have all of these a-ha moments. It’s like, “This had nothing to do with my wife or my husband. This had so much to do with some of my unhealed patterns from my own life. This had so much to do with this need for validation that I have been carrying with me since a child. This has so much to do with my fear of abandonment because my mom left when we were sick.” That’s the root cause. It’s not the bedroom. I hope that helps your readers.

I believe, Beth, that you are going so deep in a perfect way because you’re tackling what sounds very simple but it is very deep. Your three pillars are very critical and very common. I can’t help but think of how your three pillars apply to any form of betrayal in a relationship because we often focus on somebody having sexual infidelity with you. Yet there’s emotional infidelity where you find that a partner has been texting a co-worker emoji heart and this thing or when a partner has lied to you and said things that aren’t true or financial betrayal. All of the various forms of betrayal. You find this out and the brain still goes through those same processes of exactly what happened because you’re trying to put together the puzzle pieces.

Let’s imagine the person is a serial liar and told a lot of lies, which often goes hand in hand with somebody who is a betrayer. You can see that the brain’s going, “I’m trying to put it together. They said this, but then I found out that they said this.” The brain is just on a hunt for truth. It’s trying to make sense of things. Getting a partner to a place where they can ultimately, if they’re able to, tell the truth in all of the bloody details. All of the little intricacies to the person is able to say, “Oh.” Some people think it’s about some strange obsession with the details when I don’t believe it’s a strange obsession with the details.

As you’re saying, the brain has now tagged this person as a threat and saying, “If I can get some honesty here and put the pieces together and this person is honest with me. Maybe I can get back to that place of safety because of the trust that’s rebuilding.” If the person is never on us to continue to tell tales, that’s never going to happen. Your second pillar is why. We look at it, in general, “Why did you lie?” I’m going with someone who tells a lot of untruths. As you’re saying, it is always deeper. I 100% believe that if somebody, whether it’s an emotional betrayal, physical betrayal, financial betrayal, or somebody who has pathological liar tendencies. It’s like, “Why did you why did you lie often?”

As you said, the lies come from a place of deep inner shame like I had to paint a different picture or I’ve done things that, “There’s light on them, I don’t feel very good about myself. I’m going to try and cover things up.” All of the covering up only makes the other person feel more unsafe. Getting to that place of, “Why did you lie in the first place?” What is it in your history? I agree with you 100%, because I also love attachment work. If we go back to attachment styles, often there’s not that people who were securely attached that can’t betray and do some terrible things from relationships.

Often, it’s people who have insecure attachment style of one or some blend of the three types that make them more prone to being able to, as you say, be the good guy. Create a story that in their mind they had every right to do what they did and they make a story around it, “ Because you’re too aggressive, because you asked too many questions or whatever it was.” Your last pillar, again if we look at it is, how could you do this? If you care about me, if you cared about our kids, our relationship, whatever it is, how? How could you possibly?

Also, some people go into the place of, “What gave you the right? How could you do this?” Getting to those deeper questions, it’s not about an apology and moving on. It is about, as you’re so exquisitely describing, this very important path of getting to the deeper issues. If trust can’t be rebuilt, the relationship is going to be flimsy at best.

Trusting Yourself Before Your Partner

You can’t build a house on a shaky foundation. You mentioned trust and we get that a lot. Betrayed partners will ask, “When will I ever trust him again or when will I ever trust her again?” We have a very unique take on trust. I believe that trust will only happen in a very specific order. If it doesn’t happen in this order, it will never happen. What’s the order? I always start off by saying, trust begins at home. What I mean by home? I mean within us. I have to learn how to trust me. I’m not going to learn how to trust me by focusing on somebody else. I’m not going to learn how to trust me if I’m in detective mode and trying to manage somebody else’s therapy sessions.

I need to start working on me so that I can turn back on my gut instinct and I can learn to trust me. That’s for the betrayed partner, and that’s step one. That’s his or her own healing. Again, that’s not going to happen if I’m stuck in that detective mode and then guess what? The unfaithful partner has to do the same thing. They have to become trustworthy within themselves. Now, what is trust mean? I’ve got a definition that I use all the time.

Trust means I do what I say I’m going to do. That’s at its core. I’m not worried about anybody else yet. Only within me. If I’m working on my own ability to trust the world, I have to work on trusting me first, which means I have to become somebody who does what I say I’m going to do. For the unfaithful partners, it’s the same thing. If the unfaithful partner says, “I’ll go to therapy. I want to do whatever it takes to save this relationship,” but then they don’t do it. They’re not trustworthy within themselves. They’re never going to become safer anybody else because they’re not safe within their own nervous system. I say all the time, the one person that we cannot lie to is ourselves.

When you've been betrayed, don't rush to decide if you should stay or go. Heal the self first, then make a choice from a place of power, not pain. Share on X

You said it so beautifully and I am 100% in. I always say in my work, love is action. If you love yourself and you say, “I’m going to do this. I’m going to be a faithful partner.” Sometimes it’s hard. I’m not saying love is easy and doing the work for yourself and for a relationship easy. When you’re committed and you believe that love is action, then it means acting in accord with how you would expect a loving person to act to themselves and to others.

That’s a pretty high standard. When we have that mindset, it does keep us self-aligned. When we are self-aligned, then we come from that place of honor and integrity that someone else can trust because we’re walking the walk. We’re not just talking the talk. We’re not just saying, “Trust me,” and then I behave in untrustworthy ways. We’re saying trust me because look at how I behave.

Again, when we’re talking about betrayal and the betrayed partners. I will never forget. I lived three years in what I call betrayal hell. I was going to marriage counseling and it didn’t work. My husband is calling me crazy. I have therapist telling me I needed to move on already. I was stuck in the past. Therapy trauma on top of betrayal trauma was brutal for three years. One of the first things I did for myself was I took this trust again challenge. I don’t remember what it was, but I laughed now at it.

It’s like learning how to trust your partner again after betrayal. I paid money for this class. It was a joke because none of it makes sense to me. I’m like, “How am I ever going to trust this version?” I didn’t know my brain tagged him as dangerous yet. I was still just a betrayed wife trying to save my marriage and I didn’t know how. This whole thing about trust, what I realized was trust begins at home. I had to learn how to trust myself again.

My husband had to become trustworthy within himself again. The third piece is, my husband had to learn to trust me next. Then and only then would I began to began, and I say that double on purpose to trust him. That course that I took learn to how to trust your spouse again was all about monitoring phones. Not quite as much back then, but there was a little. It was the early days of all this monitoring that’s going on. It was track them. Look at their emails, then you’ll build trust when you don’t see negative things.

I’m like, “This seems so backwards to me.” You’re telling me I need to be a detective or a parent or a mom. Trust is very different when we’re working with people. I want each person individually to heal themselves and become independently healthy. As the unfaithful partner is learning how to speak the truth, then they start opening up and sharing with the betrayed partner.

They learn how to trust the betrayed partner. What happens if that’s consistent over a long enough period of time? The betrayed partner’s brain goes, “This is a different person. They’re sharing with me. They’re giving me their why. They’re sharing them with me. They’re doing what they say they’re going to do without me having to follow up. They’re showing up differently.” That’s a betrayed partner learning to trust the unfaithful again, but it’s not going to happen in any other order.

I want 100% agree with you. I wish we had more time because there is so much to offer. Readers, I hope this sounds affirming because it is a different approach. Beth, it’s aligned with how I work because it honors the trauma perspective. It honors the trust rebuilding and you take it deeply with subtle critical nuances that help individuals and couples see that this is about self-work. It’s about other work, the partners work. It’s about a lot of work on the partners.

If they want to transform, change and become someone who can be trusted and if they don’t and you see that the person doesn’t want to do self-work. They don’t want to engage, then that might be where you ultimately come to the place where you say, “This is not the person I want to be in relationship with.” I will never feel safe with someone who isn’t able to offer safety to themselves. Much less to be able to offer safety to me. Life’s too short to be with people who don’t want to be safe.

That’s right.

We need to be safe in ourselves, but I mean by someone else. If we have a barking dog in a room, we can do all the stuff what we want but we can’t let down our guard if this other person, I’m comparing them to the to the barking, biting dog. If we want to feel safe, we have to have a partner who wants to do the work.

The deep work that each person needs to do is not going to happen in a marriage counseling environment. It’s individual work. That’s why when we work with couples, we don’t work with them together. The betrayed partner, whether it’s a man or a woman, needs trauma support. The unfaithful partner needs to do those three pillars. The what, why and the how. You’re not going to do those together. Not going to happen. Individual healing.

It makes sense because sometimes when I work with a couple. One or both will be in individual therapy because if there are deep childhood issues that aren’t resolved, you can’t resolve that. You can’t fully address that in relationship therapy. You can if you’re willing to put in a lot of time over lots of years, but again, you want that individual work. I appreciate how you do it in such a structured way that helps get to those very deep roots of what caused the betrayal in the first place. That’s the what, the why and the how.

If somebody can get to that, then they can show up as partner 2.0, then they love them. I think people miss about self-work. To me, it is such a joy and a privilege to do self-work. It’s like one of the main reasons to be on the planet. For someone who doesn’t want to do the self-work, my big question is, why? Why don’t you want to become your best self? You might want the best car and the best this and the best that and the best house. Why don’t you want to be your best self? That’s the part that you live with day in and day out. Why don’t you want that?

I know. It’s mind-boggling, isn’t it? A lot of times, there’s just too much fear and shame.

You got to the answer, it’s the fear. It takes a lot of courage to do self-work, but the rewards are incredible. Beth, you are amazing. I’m so grateful for you and the work you do. I love your program. Before we sign off, could you tell our readers, is there any other piece before we talk about where people can find you and your work? Any other final wrap-up points?

I want to let all betrayed partners know they’re not crazy. Number one, there is a path out of the pain. Too many times, the betrayed partners, because society as a whole, there’s such a lack of education about betrayal trauma. That’s my mission, is to spread the word that betrayal trauma is real. The PTSD, the survival mode, and living in fighter flight 24/7 is all real. I want them to know that there’s a way to get to the other side of that, though.

They don’t have to stay stuck there. I want them to know it’s real and I get it, but there’s a way out. For the unfaithful partners or the spouses of the betrayed partners that might be reading. Living with shame. sometimes feel like that’s the only way to live. They don’t know what it’s like to live shame free. I’m always telling unfaithful partners, whatever platform I’m on, “If you are an unfaithful partner and you have more to share of your story, if you’ve got secrets or having an affair that nobody knows about, reach out.”

We meet unfaithful partners at a very compassionate place. We do not look at them through a moral judgment. The betrayed partners can. I get that, but in order to help them heal, we can’t look at them through a moral lens. We have to look at them as somebody who’s got some deep wounds that made horrific traumatizing choices. We want them to know that we hear them and we can help them through that.

Thank you for clarifying that because we can’t, as clinicians, see people throw a moral lens. We always have to use the muscle even if we might disagree with the behavior or not find it something that we would do. We were able to go into that place of non-judgment, compassion and empathy. Positive regard even, because that’s where healing comes from. Not feeding the shame by judging somebody. It’s about finding out the whys. I know we have to wrap up but just one more question. Do you work with people where it’s not sexual betrayal, but also emotional betrayal where there have been a lot of lies told or financial lies or emotional cheating? Do you also work with those populations?

Absolutely.

It makes sense. One, there’s active sex that caused the betrayal. It’s interesting. Sometimes, I’ll have people say, “If my partner had only just had sex with this person or with somebody else, that might be a lot easier to get over than if they had told me this big web of lies about who they were or what they did or if they had been cleared to me about their gambling. They betrayed me and I found out with our friend. Whatever it is.” Thank you for clarifying that. You see it as a big unfortunate betrayal umbrella.

I’m just going to throw one other thing that we do as well because in the last ten years, this is on the rise. It’s sex addiction and porn addiction. That can be betrayal as well. Betrayal is just keeping secrets. We have a lot of couples who reach out to us and there’s no infidelity with other people, but there’s a porn addiction. That’s betrayal as well.

We could do another episode on that because I know that there are even some psychotherapists out there who say that porn isn’t a problem and that we should let people do whatever they want with their sexuality. On one level, my brain can get that. On the other level, I say not when it’s hurting someone else.

That’s right. If it’s done in secret on top of that.

We go back to the piece where one of my taglines is secrets feed shame. When we’re having secrets, we feel badly about ourselves. Why are we doing? Why is the secret there? Thank you again, Beth. Where can our readers find you?

They can go right to my website at HealingWithBeth.com. I try to keep it very simple. On my website, they can take a quiz. We have quizzes for both the betrayed and the unfaithful. They could see exactly what stage they’re in. That’s usually what we recommend. Let’s see what stage you’re in and then we can help you get out of that stage and move to the next. I have a book out called On the Other Side of Pain: Healing After Betrayal. That’s out on Amazon as well. On social media, I’m on Beth Fischer. I’m all I’m there such as Instagram, YouTube, TikTok. They can find me on all the platforms.

Thank you and readers. When you’re ready, click find Beth. Find the support that you deserve, whether you’re the betrayer or the betrayed. Healing is definitely possible so that you can have the life that you deserve. Whether you choose to stay or to go, you deserve the healing from the inside out. Beth, it has been a joy. It is been a privilege. Thank you so much.

Dr. Carla, thank you so much for having me. I admire you and your work. We are so aligned on so many things. This has been a pleasure for me to be here.

Thank you. It is a joy and a pleasure for me as well. Readers, as always, I thank you for your time, your energy, and for supporting the mission of wellness in yourself and around the world. This is Imperfect Love.

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About Beth Fischer

Beth Fischer, M.Ed., is a betrayal trauma specialist and the creator of The Betrayal Trauma Healing Method® and The Integrity Journey®, which have guided more than 20,000 individuals worldwide through infidelity recovery and betrayal trauma healing.

Recognized as a leading voice in betrayal trauma recovery, Beth’s work has reached millions, with over 7 million views across social media. Her content is often described as “a lifeline” by those navigating the devastating aftermath of infidelity—offering both practical tools to calm an overwhelmed nervous system and powerful validation that betrayal trauma is real and not their fault.

Beth’s trauma-informed, individual-first approach challenges the traditional “reconciliation-first” model that dominates most marriage counseling. Instead of prioritizing the relationship, her work focuses on stabilizing the nervous system, restoring self-trust, and helping individuals rebuild a grounded sense of self before making decisions about the future.

She holds a master’s degree in counseling and is a certified Betrayal Trauma Specialist, with additional certifications in Root Cause Therapy and Neuro Linguistic Programming. Through her courses, coaching programs, and widely followed content, Beth teaches emotional regulation, identity rebuilding, and true healing after relationship trauma.

A survivor of betrayal trauma herself, Beth created her method after experiencing firsthand how traditional approaches can re-traumatize those who are already struggling. Today, she is reshaping the conversation around infidelity recovery—from “saving the marriage” to “healing the individual.”

Carla Marie Manly, PhD

Carla Marie Manly, PhD

Beyond Betrayal: Untangling the Post-Infidelity Trauma Loop

Connect with Dr. Carla Manly:

Books by Dr. Carla Manly:

Imperfect Love Relationship & Oracle Card Deck by Dr. Carla Manly:

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Listen to the podcast here

Beyond Betrayal: Untangling the Post-Infidelity Trauma Loop

Why Staying Isn’t Always the Answer

Defining Strength in Trauma Recovery

Why the Past Changes During Betrayal

The Difference Between 1.0 and 2.0 Versions

Understanding the Brain’s Tagging Mechanism

The Three Pillars of True Disclosure

Trusting Yourself Before Your Partner

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About Beth Fischer

Carla Marie Manly, PhD

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