Reflections in the Aftermath of Infidelity

Why does it hurt so much and what can we do about it?

Welcome to Lust in Translation, a newsletter about intimacy, pleasure and modern relationships by yours truly—sexologist Natassia Miller. If you’re new here and not subscribed yet, now’s a great time to fix that!

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When I was 23, I moved back to Brazil for love. I had just graduated from college and done an internship at a hedge fund in São Paulo the summer before. That’s when we met.

It was a messy long distance relationship. My father passed away my senior year, and I was alone in New York City. So, by all accounts, my decision to move felt precipitous. But in that moment, it felt like something solid to hold on to.

I arrived right before Brazil’s Carnaval, which is one big promiscuous bacchanal. There’s an iconic song for the occasion: “I’ll love you all year, except in February”, when Carnaval usually takes place.

He was going on a boys’ trip with his cousins. I wasn’t invited. So I spent the next four days at his family’s farm with his mom.

Something felt off. But I ignored it. I had just moved my entire life to be with him. I wasn’t going to give up so soon.

Turns out psychology has a word for this: trauma denial. If you’ve ever wondered, how did he or she not know?!, it’s not stupidity that was driving it but rather self-preservation.

Trauma denial is “a type of self-delusion that we employ when too much is at stake and we have too much to lose,” writes psychologist Esther Perel in her book The State of Affairs. “The mind needs coherence, so it disposes of inconsistencies that threaten the structure of our lives.”

A year later, he told me he slept with two women during that trip. What was a relief for him felt like an unbearable burden for me. I remember thinking: I wish he had never told me.

Which brings us to one of the hardest questions infidelity raises: When should we tell?

It also raises other questions: When would we want to know? Does that depend on whether it was a one-time thing or an affair with someone they’ve fallen in love with? When is it actually helpful and when is sadistic?

Psychologist Lisa Spiegel encourages us to consider whether a disclosure is honest, helpful, or kind. What’s your intention in sharing? What do you want your partner to do with that information?

Is respect, in certain circumstances, not sharing everything?

I decided to stay, but it set the tone for a relationship that brought out the worst in us. Sometimes, that’s what happens when you navigate infidelity without professional guidance.

I began to think about infidelity a lot after that. Why we do it, how different cultures approach it, how we cope with it, and why—even with so many public forms of reprehension and laws throughout history—it persists.

In my private practice, I work with couples navigating infidelity. I see firsthand how painful it is, and how it can build the relationship anew.

An estimated one in three couples in the US are impacted by infidelity, according to clinical psychologist Dr. Janis Spring in her book After the Affair.

For something so common, it’s surprising that there is no shared definition for it.

What do you consider cheating? Is it porn? An OnlyFans subscription? Flirty texts? Liking an Instagram bikini pic? Having feelings for someone else without becoming sexually involved?

The problem isn’t just the behavior. It’s that we often don’t define the boundaries of our relationship until something crosses them.

And when infidelity becomes public, the reactions are often extreme. Like the couple on the jumbotron at a Coldplay concert.

While there is no question that what they did was wrong, last week’s viral scandal highlights how we as a society have a more visceral reaction to cheating than we do to violence.

One popular comment on Instagram said there should be laws that strip everything away from cheaters, including their finances.

As journalist Kat Rosenfield pointed out, “There are literal mass murderers who enjoy more anonymity and less opprobrium than these two.”

In the US, we tend to be more comfortable with violence than with sex.

The video game Grand Theft Auto sparked controversy in America around a pixelated sex scene—not the murder sprees. Meanwhile in other countries, it’s censored or banned because of the latter.

Hollywood film ratings reflect this, too. Movies with nudity or consensual sex are rated more harshly than those with blood and gore.

In her book Lust in Translation, Pamela Druckerman notes, “Adultery provokes more outrage in America than in almost any other country on record (Ireland and the Philippines are two exceptions).”

But why?

Monogamy and the rise of romantic idealism

The history of monogamy is rooted not in romance, but in economics.

As humans settled from nomadic tribes into agricultural communities, monogamy served a purpose: to protect lineage and inheritance.

For centuries, marriage was an economic arrangement. Love (and lust) was found elsewhere—a privilege given solely to men. Sex within marriage was a duty, mainly for reproduction.

But everything changed in the last 150 years. The Industrial Revolution, Hollywood, feminism, and birth control shifted the cultural tides.

We moved from marriage as strategic survival to marriage as fulfillment. From large family units in the countryside to isolated nuclear homes in the city (and later, the suburbs).

In that pressure cooker, we started asking our partners to be everything: best friend, lover, co-parent, financial partner, soul mate.

Ironically, “our high expectations for personal happiness might even make us more likely to cheat. After all, aren’t we entitled to an affair, if that’s what it takes to be fulfilled?” writes Druckerman.

It’s no wonder modern romanticism can feel like an impossible performance.

Why does cheating hurt so much?

Sex, once a reproductive obligation, became linked with pleasure and love.

In the past, affairs were a threat to financial stability, yet usually tolerated (by women, I might add).

Today, they feel intolerable because they strike at something far more personal: our identity and sense of self-worth.

Am I not enough? Did I make this all up? What do they have that I don’t?

We’ve collapsed the individual into the couple. We give up hobbies, friendships, even parts of ourselves in the name of “us.”

So when “us” is fractured, we’re left wondering who we even are.

And the pain is real.

Studies show that heartbreak activates the same regions of the brain as physical pain. It triggers shortness of breath, gastrointestinal distress, increase in heart rate and chest tightness.

While there are endless reasons for why we cheat, Perel says that the common ones are “often a longing and yearning for an emotional connection, novelty, freedom, autonomy, sexual intensity; a wish to recapture lost parts of ourselves; or an attempt to bring back vitality in the face of loss and tragedy.”

So what do we do?

First, we have to name our definitions. Talk about what “cheating” means to you. Don’t wait for betrayal to have that conversation.

Second, we need better responses—not just punishment and shame.

As holistic sex educator Lauren Rogers puts it, when an affair becomes public, “we tend to see the entire globe rally together to shame sexual behavior.” But we’re not having important conversations about how to sustain eroticism or connection in long-term relationships. “Instead,” she says, “we’re continuing to feed our culture these old, outdated, and antiquated scripts that it is not polite to talk about sex.”

If you’re wondering how to start the conversation, I created the Intimacy Card Deck for this very purpose.

Lastly—and I cannot stress this enough—rebuild your sense of self-worth in ways that exist outside of your relationship. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Say yes to the painting class or dance lessons you used to love. Take yourself on dates. Do things that remind you of who you are, and what lights you up, outside of being a partner.

This is where I begin with clients recovering from infidelity: not just with the couple, but with the self. Because healing is as much about repairing the relationship, as it is about remembering your wholeness.

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If this resonated, please share it with someone who could benefit from it as well. Thank you!

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