"I was sure we were a good couple": The moment she discovered her husband was cheating on her

Couples therapy is perhaps one of the most complex projects in life, but despite this, almost none of us learn how to deal with the crises that come with it. Burnout, infidelity, sexual difficulties, money, raising children, gaps in personal development, and negative communication — all these are topics that arise again and again in couples therapy rooms, sometimes turning the relationship into a place of loneliness, distance, and helplessness.

After more than 25 years of working with couples, I decided to write a book that brings these difficulties to the forefront and shows what really happens inside the therapy room — not only from the perspective of the couple, but also through the eyes of the therapist.

The book, "Until the Storm Passes - A Glimpse into the Couples Therapy Room," describes 10 cases dealing with various marital crises. The stories are based on hundreds of real cases, with details changed and blurred. Alongside the stories, the book incorporates my personal diary as a therapist, containing professional dilemmas, decisions, moments of doubt, and insights born along the way.

The goal is not only to describe the crises, but to illustrate how couples therapy can help spouses understand the focal points of difficulty, identify patterns that promote or hinder the relationship, get to know the "inner child," and acquire tools for dealing with conflicts.

One of the chapters deals with Ella and Alon, a couple forced to deal with one of the most shaking crises a relationship can go through — infidelity. Ella discovers that her husband is maintaining an intimate relationship with another woman, and within a short time, the two find themselves in the therapy room, as she tries to understand if there is any way to continue from here.

Ella and Alon / Infidelity

Phone call

Ella called me, introduced herself, and immediately burst into tears. Only after a long minute was she able to speak. She said that she had been snooping on her husband's phone and discovered he was cheating on her.

"I feel like packing him a suitcase and kicking him out of the house right now. Everyone tells me to leave him, but I don't know. We were a good couple."

She is crying again: "I don't know what to do."

I suggested she come to a meeting together with her husband. A few days later she called and said they would come, "but I don't believe there is a chance for this."

Many people who experience infidelity feel a range of intense and negative emotions: insult, humiliation, anger, anxiety, and a desire for revenge. Some make an immediate decision to end the relationship, while others choose to try to rehabilitate it. Ella and Alon were on their way to me, but I still didn't know what they would decide. The process of rehabilitating a relationship after infidelity is always difficult and complex, and there is no guarantee it will succeed.

First meeting

Outside, it is pouring rain, but the therapy room is warm and cozy. A gentle knock on the door is heard. I open it and see Ella for the first time. Her hair is tied in a ponytail and her eyes are swollen from crying and sleepless nights. She enters, and Alon follows her with a hesitant step. He is much taller, his face is covered with stubble, and his eyes are sad. Both are dressed in jeans, looking like just another young Tel Aviv couple, but the signs of the crisis are evident on them.

They sit on the armchairs. Ella is hunched forward, clutching her phone, on which the message light is blinking. She is a thin woman with a delicate face. Alon sits next to her, playing with a cigarette pack. He leans back in the armchair and waits.

Ella is the first to break the silence: "I just want to understand why. Why this happened."

When Alon speaks, he addresses me, not her: "I don't know where to start."

A heavy silence falls again. I see that Ella is trying to hold back, but cannot stop the crying. I look at both of them: "I hear the pain," I say, "start from where you want to start."

The crying fades, and Ella introduces them. She is 34, Alon is 36, married for eight years. They have three children. Alon works at a high-tech company, and Ella is a social worker.

She stops, embarrassed: "Help me continue..."

Although I heard on the phone what brought them to me, I asked to hear it here, from both of them. Ella describes their routine: "We were a normative couple. A good couple. Or at least that's what I thought. Although there was distance in the relationship, I attributed it to our lives. We are really busy — work, studies, small children. It seems to me that everyone is like that."

That evening, she says, was just another evening. "I don't know why I did it, but his phone was on the table and I took it. I tried a few passwords. In the end, it was the password of our wedding date, and it... it jumped right into my eyes. Her name... her messages. I felt as if the ground was slipping out from under my feet."

She immediately confronted Alon and threw the correspondence she discovered in his face. Alon was surprised, but did not deny it. He immediately admitted that for several months he had been maintaining an intimate relationship with Limor, a colleague at work.

From "Until the Storm Passes - A Glimpse into the Couples Therapy Room"

Dr. Ronit Sharon is the director of the Kesharim Institute for Couples Therapy and a lecturer at the Hebrew University.