Customer Reviews

Intimacy After Infidelity: How to Rebuild and Affair-Proof Your Marriage

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

It's an amazing book. It's as if the authors were standing inside of me when I found about my wife's infidelity. Dealing with the hurt, the feeling of betrayal the anger, the shock; they were with me and then they took me into understanding my emotions and evaluating my options. Should I stay should I go. Should we try to repair this, can it be repaired? How do I overcome the hurt and anger? It was all there in the book. We decided to make a go of it our relationship is stronger more trusting and loving than it ever was. I never would have believed it. Get this book!

If you have gone through an infidelity this book is a must read, imo. I just recently learned of my husbands affair (3 weeks ago) and I have struggled with direction. He is overseas so I have felt very "stuck" in what to do to move on. This book gives you a place to start, without your partner. It does not rely on your partner giving input or reading along with you. It just really focuses on YOU and what is normal and how to move past it, whether that be alone or with your partner.

The other thing I really liked is that is does not focus on being overly emotional. It does a great job expressing the emotions without leaving you sitting there sobbing. I purchased several books when I found out about my husband affair and with the first two I tried, I found myself feeling worse and even more hopeless. There was just too much personal emotion put into the book and I have enough of my own feelings going on without needing to read about the affair the authors went through and how they were still driving around sobbing 6 months after the fact.

And maybe it is just because I am delusional right now, but I actually really liked, and needed, to read that your relationship CAN be stronger after an affair. One thing that struck me in another book I was reading, was that stated they wouldn't say the relationship was stronger, but that they had gotten through it in tact and were happy again. :\ That did not cut it for me. Obviously our relationship wasn't truly happy/healthy to begin with or the affair wouldn't have happened. I NEEDED some hope that we could not just get past this affair, but build our relationship to be stronger then it was before. This book gave me that hope.

I could go on and on, but at this time if you are here looking at reviews for this book, it's because you are struggling. You don't need to read me go on and on. So to shorten it up, if you are looking to move on, if you are looking for hope and if you are looking to preserve your marriage despite the infidelity, I have no doubt this book will give you HOPE, something that, if you are anything like me, you are really needing right now.

Among the several books I have been reading on the same theme, this book stands out for me because of the way it recommends how one can go about evaluating if the relationship in peril has a high/low chance of succeeding in the long term. I especially find the concept of "Needs Love" vs "Being Loved" useful, and also the "Three Deal-Breakers" as a helpful way of gauging one's prospect in salvaging the relationship. These are all covered in the initial few chapters of the book.

The remaining chapters are helpful for getting in terms with one's own emotional psyche, the stages of how and why things happen, and how best to move forward. Many other books cover these areas in various depths, with various emphasis, and using various approaches that are actually all rather similar with respect to the processes of bringing the reader's emotional and psychological state into perspective, and to helping the reader strive towards achieving the same end result- i.e. a more resilient and fulfilling relationship.

Having read so many books specifically on marriage and partner relationship - this book was by far the best.
It deals with the core reasons why infidelity happens, the specific types of problems in a relationship that lead to the decision to be unfaithful. Steven D. Solomon, Ph.D. of The Relationship Institute has written a book like no other.
I have now 3 copies and have passed them on. It is a great read for couples who have communication difficulties. To have this knowledge, early in a marriage, could save a lot of pain and heartache.

My husband had an affair - i found out a month ago and this book has helped me more than going to marriage counseling. It's a great value...I highly recommend this book to anyone...

If you're considering buying this book, it's likely because you or your partner has committed some form of infidelity and you're looking for guidance as you try to cope with the pain and rebuild your relationship. Drs. Solomon & Teagno have written a five-star general fix-your-relationship book, but only a three-star guide to recovering from an affair. Certainly, one of the best way to prevent infidelity is to have a relationship that is sufficiently fulfilling that neither partner needs to look to third parties to fill emotional or physical gaps, and to that extent "Intimacy After Infidelity" succeeds. The suggested techniques and tips will improve your communication with your partner, which will add multiple levels of intimacy to your relationship, which in turn will make transgressing the relationship's boundaries seem less attractive.

That's great, but you're probably looking for something else or something more at this point. You might be looking for techniques for re-establishing trust, for getting over the immediate pain of what your partner did, for deciding whether to stay married or get divorced, for forgiving, or for understanding how men and women approach infidelity differently. There isn't much of that in "Intimacy After Infidelity." Other books - like After the Affair: Healing the Pain and Rebuilding Trust When a Partner Has Been Unfaithful and Not "Just Friends": Rebuilding Trust and Recovering Your Sanity After Infidelity cover those areas far more comprehensively. "Intimacy After Infidelity" is excellent long-term convalescent care for your marriage, but what you may need at the moment is trauma surgery.

The authors do briefly address the "should I stay or should I go?" question, but that discussion highlights perhaps the most frustrating weakness in the book. They identify three "deal-breakers," and say that as long as none of those are present, the relationship theoretically can be saved. Two of these "deal-breakers" depend on whether the partners love each other. The problem here is that the book's discussion of love is irritatingly weak. The authors distinguish two types of love: "needs love" (loving someone for what he does for you) and "being love" (loving someone for who he is). Obviously, "being love" is the one you want, and if your relationship involves mostly "needs love," it may not have the right kind of love to survive. Okay, great... except the discussion ends there. There's no effort to explore the differences further, and the authors offer no techniques to evaluate the type of love that you and your partner have. The distinction merits a chapter; it gets two pages. At this point - and this is early on - you'll probably put the book down and start searching the internet for ways to identify the kind of love that you have. It's that important, but the authors spend next to no time on it.

The only other weakness is the way that the anecdotes/examples are structured. Using examples of couples with common relationship problems as a way to illustrate abstract advice is staple of relationship books. The problem is that the anecdotes are too detailed. With all the detail about their childhoods, jobs, outside friendships, previous relationships, attitudes, etc., you're probably going to see more differences than similarities between yourself and these fictional partners. You'll find it difficult to relate, and you'll find yourself wanting to skip ahead to the next chapter.

And that's particularly surprising given that the greatest strength of "Intimacy After Infidelity" is its general, almost universal applicability. It's not written specifically for recovery from an emotional affair, a one-night stand, an affair with a co-worker, the rekindling of a relationship with an old flame, or any other particular scenario. The authors state this explicitly: the book is for anyone dealing with infidelity of any kind, however you define it. It's written for anyone who wants a better relationship, and the techniques can improve your relationship no matter what specific things were done to damage it. You're going to learn to identify your emotions and to communicate them in a non-judgmental way. After reading this general advice, the extreme specificity of the example couples just seems incongruous. By the latter chapters you'll probably find yourself skipping the examples entirely.

I'd give "Intimacy After Infidelity" to any couple at any point in their relationship. It would make an excellent pre-marriage counseling book. It definitely will give you the tools to prevent affairs caused by anything other than substance abuse, sexual compulsions, or deep psychological problems. You can prevent the "normal" causes of infidelities with the suggested techniques. But if you're not at the rebuilding stage and you need to get over that initial shock and heartbreak, another affair-recovery book might be for you.

This is one of the best books I've ever read! It's really given me hope that my relationship can be repaired and that I can trust my boyfriend again.

When glancing through the book the first couple of times, I was skeptical. There is a chapter on the four stages of love. Now, I've read up on the stages before that other authors have written about, and I wasn't planning to read through this chapter. Glancing through later chapters though, I realized that I really did need to know more about the stages the author has, so I went and read the book from page one. Right off the bat I loved it. I couldn't stop reading. The book didn't make me feel bad or disgusted (like some other books on infidelity did). The book explains why and when infidelity occurs in a relationship. I always thought that my relationship had already made it through to the strongest stages, but this gave me an eye opener. I was communicating right, I was doing everything well in the relationship, but my partner wasn't. This hindered us and left us in stage 2 for who-knows-how-long. I never realized the poor state of our relationship, because I've always been incredibly happy in it, but my partner didn't know how to communicate properly and thus hindered our progress. Stage 2 is where infidelity happens. This gave me hope. Why? Because if you make it out of stage 2 you will be safe. Neither partner will want to nor need to be unfaithful.

Reading more it explains the foundation of relationships and three things that you need to work on before you can move on to an infidelity-free, safe place in your relationship. In a nut-shell: You've got to know how you are feeling and express it. Then you've got to be able to communicate well with each other in conflict. This book teaches you how to do those two things. After you've got those down you can be truly affectionate.

The book also explains the reasons why people are unfaithful, and how depending on your partner's particular reason, how you can prevent it from happening again. It's mostly a lot of hard internal work for the unfaithful person, but if they are dedicated to making the relationship work, they will read this book too. In fact, they NEED to read it in order for it to be of much help in saving your own relationship. But good news: I got my boyfriend to read it and at chapter 2 he told me it was a really good book, and already we are reconnecting and communicating better. I am loving him more, and even have the courage to forgive him. I feel that one day I will even be able to trust him again.

This book gave me hope, and it's probably the most important book in my life.

I really needed this book in my life. This is an easy, quick read, but really gets to the core about love & relationships. The book arrived within days, I would definetly keep this book and even buy it as a gift for a friend if needed. It really helps with your healing process at such a trying time, no matter what you decide to do with ur situation. THANK YOU!!!