What would you do? (marital 'infidelity'?)

[Happyhippychick]

127. I'm a marriage counselor and I read all of the replies

I think there is no such thing as wrong or right in terms of advice, each situation is unique and none of us really knows what goes on in someone else's marriage no matter how well we know someone.

Infidelity is a symptom of a marriage in trouble. Unfortunately since it is such a huge boundary crosser, the attention goes to the infidelity instead of the problems that exist in the marriage beside that one. Therefore much time is spent on that issue and it is hard to get to the bigger, more significant issues of what has gone wrong in the relationship. The trouble is due to failures on the part of both parties, if your friend was completely blindsided then I assume he was not paying attention or purposely ignoring things his wife was telling him. This does not mean that I sanction infidelity, it just means that I know it is a more complicated issue then "this is all your fault because you cheated."

Successful marriages are very difficult to obtain, we all carry a set of expectations about how the world should be and we don't even realize it. When those expectations aren't met, the feelings of disappointment are deep and we don't even know why.

I suggest he go to counseling regardless of whether she will accompany him. He needs to figure out what he wants his life to look like without relying on her to make it so. I have saved many marriages and I have been unable to save many marriages, at the end of the day the two people involved both have to be committed to changes that will make the marriage work. If they simply expect the other one to do it then it won't happen.