5 Effective Ways To help your husband
heal after your infidelity
You screwed up. You had an affair, and you feel terrible.
I get it. It’s awful, and there’s no way to take it back.
Seeing the look on your husbands face when he found out that you were unfaithful
on “Discovery Day” was enough to break your heart in pieces.
So what can you do now?
Is there any hope that he can forgive you and heal so your marriage can be save?
Yes, I believe there can be hope for your marriage.
It happened for mine. I almost lost it all with my stubbornness, but once the affair fog lifted and I saw all I could lose, I fought hard for my marriage.
And I believe if you also sincerely want to save your marriage,
you have a much better chance than if you stayed ambivalent and back and forth in the affair.
Remember, your husbands healing begins with you.
Just as it does all wayward spouses.
You’ll need dedication, consistency, and a lot of patience and kindness toward him as he goes through his own process of grief and roller coaster emotions.
But if you’ll do all this, plus a determination to do whatever it takes,
I believe you can heal your husbands heart and restore the trust and love between you.
Friend, there is nobody like you who can help him heal the most.
You are what I like to call the “healing gatekeeper” for his heart.
You guard the door of his heart to facilitate the healing that is broken right now.
Your love allows trust, kindness, patience, accountability and honesty to come through.
It’s just a fact many unfaithful spouses have a hard time accepting for some reason.
But we broke their hearts, and it’s our job to help them heal their hearts again.
If our marriages have any chance of surviving, this is vitally important for us to understand.
Although this list is not exclusive, it is a beginning, and it’s the 5 most important steps to take early on.
The top 5 ways to help your husband heal after your infidelity:
1. Be sure all ties to the other man are broken.
This may be obvious, but it is also likely going to be the hardest to follow through with in the beginning.
- Push past the withdrawal. There is something called withdrawal that occurs, much like when an addict goes without their drug of choice. It’s uncomfortable and hard at first. But keep your eye on the prize-your husband’s healing and your marriage’s survival is at stake. Don’t make the mistake I did and let this one drag on…you just might go back to your affair partner too many times and risk losing your husband for good.
- Cut off any means of communication with affair partner. Don’t leave any openings that he could communicate with you or that you could contact him in a weak moment (that means blocking him on all social media and his number on your phone). I realize this is a hard step to make, but it’s critical. Keep reminding yourself, every contact you make with your affair partner, is a step backwards. If you REALLY want to save your marriage and you’re tired of feeling so confused and torn up inside, you’ve got to end all contact.
If you’re struggling with this, I encourage you to read would your affair partner make a good spouse?
Here’s a visual for you when you’re feeling tempted 
to contact your affair partner, I used to think of it like playing the game of Sorry.
You move up the board and things are going good, then you roll the dice and it has you go back to the beginning of the game to start all over. Having contact with your affair partner, however minor you think it is, is like going back to the beginning of healing for your marriage and for yourself.
Even if your husband does not find out you had contact, YOU will know. And your heart cannot heal from the effects of the affair until all contact is broken off.
If you’re still struggling with this, you can read more about breaking off an affair here.
2. Make yourself completely accountable to your husband.
My second advice for women who were unfaithful, may be hard at times but it goes along with the process of recovery from your affair.
- Be accountable of your time away from your husband. We’re not used to giving an account of where we are and what we’re doing. Or, show proof we really were where we said we were going to be. It was hard for me at first too. But then I realized- I was the one that created this mess for us– not him. So, I had to own up to the consequences if I wanted to get my marriage back and have my husband trust me again.
- I didn’t even go out shopping alone very much at that time, and when I did,
I had my cell phone on and always answered when he called. Not answering his calls was also a trigger for my husband, so I was diligent with that.
Just remember, this season won’t last forever. But the more consistent you are in this, the quicker he’ll heal.
- Give him all your passwords and emails. Let him have complete access to all your social media accounts, your emails and your phone.
- Understand how he feels when you’re not with him. Leaving the house will be a huge trigger for your husband and he’s going to be worried. You would be too if the roles were reversed. What helps even more is when you take a proactive approach and show him everything before he even asks. This is all very important if you want to heal your husband’s heart after your affair.
I’ll be honest, there will be times you’ll get sick of being accountable. Frustration and despair will likely come in when it seems everything you do is shrouded in a cloud of suspicion. Those were hard days for us.
But the hard days became less and less, and eventually he trusted me again.
It can happen for you too.
3. Be completely honest…don’t hide things, no matter how small they seem.
- Letting him into your secret world. Your husband will likely want to know some things that will be hard to talk about with him. Oftentimes, the betrayed spouse feels shut out of a portion of your life. There were secrets and lies told.
He doesn’t know what is true and what was false. There will be times he’ll want to ask you questions and understand what you did, where you went, possibly about sex, etc… agree to talk about these things for a timed session each day, and then agree to leave it until the next day again. There has to be a balance.
- Remember that the other man got to see into a window of your marriage, if anything was spoken to him about it, unbeknownst to your husband. That is really difficult and painful for many husband’s to think about. Just being aware of what this will help.
- Always tell him the truth. Some betrayed spouses need to have their questions answered to heal properly. If you lie now, you’ll further set back the rebuilding process as he’ll likely eventually find out.
There’s nothing that can harm your marriage recovery after an affair like further lies and inconsistencies. Honesty is always far easier than trying to remember what your last story was, and it’s a key to helping heal your husband’s heart.
4. Be willing to do whatever it takes to heal your marriage.
I know I’ve said it before, but it’s that important I’m saying it again. It’s always one of my greatest pieces of advice to women who were unfaithful.
- Just be willing to do whatever it takes to restore your husbands trust and help heal his heart.
- When your husband sees you are sincerely trying to restore trust and treating him with compassion and empathy it will help him heal faster.
- Find out what HIS love language is and seek to do those things that express love to HIM. I highly suggest the book, “The 5 Love Languages” By, Gary Chapman, if you haven’t read it already. It is really helpful to understand that we each express and feel love differently.
A lot of reasons women have affairs is because they’re love language was being neglected, so you can also go over the book together.
My other advice for the unfaithful wife is to give your husband a chance again
Let him have your heart and spend time depositing into your marriage,
and you’ll know you’ve at least given as much as possible to help your marriage heal and recover from your affair.
6. Sincerely apologize, in words and actions.
Although I hesitate putting this one on here, because it is obvious, it still needs to be said.
Yes, your husband probably doesn’t believe that you’re really sorry, or that it even matters that you’re sorry right now.
But it’s still important to say. The thing is, as the ones who cheated, our words have become less effective and believable. How you show him you’re truly sorry for breaking his heart is by your actions. All the ways I gave in the previous 4 steps are a real start. Be determined to have your marriage work.
A LOT of the marriage healing is up to you by making the right choices and being humble and transparent with him. He has to do his part of forgiving you, but it all really starts with you saying and behaving that you’re truly remorseful.
To review, When you’re determined to do these first 5 ways to heal your husband’s heart after your affair, it will happen.
- The first one is the foundational step, break off any contact or future possibly of contact with the affair partner.
- Second, be accountable about your time away from him, you might have to be specific to prove to him you really were where you said you were. It’s hard but it won’t last forever. Better yet, use this season to just be together with your spouse more often. He’ll feel more reassured and you’ll get more quality time together.
- Third, always be honest. Answer his questions and then agree to time out from affair talk.
- Fourth, Be determined to make it work, no matter what it takes. You can do this! The future rewards are worth it, trust me.
- And last, Show him your sorry with your actions, every day. Words are still important but actions speak louder than words, right?
Do those things you did when you first met him to woo his love and affections. Be irresistible to him with your love, kindness and compassion and you’ll soon see his heart healing, and the trust slowly being restored.
If you haven’t read it yet, I’d encourage you to read my quick letter to you if you are the unfaithful wife .
Have you read my recent post “what do you want your life to be?”
If you’re the hurt husband trying to find some help and answers, start here.
You might also like to read the category of posts for the unfaithful wife
