Seeing Sandra Bullock’s photo on every major magazine cover after her husband’s affairs were made public has made me wonder – how do women decide whether to leave the one they love after infidelity is made public?
Hillary Clinton stood by her man. Halle Berry left her beau after his affairs were made public. Mrs. Kobe Bryant is still with her basketball star. Sandra Bullock and Tiger’s wife are still sorting things out.
Although each woman has to make a decision that is best for herself, I wonder – is it possible to reconcile and have faith in your mate when you stay with them after they’ve cheated?
In deciding whether to stay or go, I put myself in these women’s shoes and decided three over-riding thoughts would occupy my mind:
1. It will happen again. Call my cynical, but if you cheat once on your mate, you will do it again. The idea of being unfaithful and having an epiphany where you’ll never cheat again seems very far-fetched to me. If a person is going to stay with a cheating mate, I believe they are resigning themselves to the fact that it most likely is going to happen again.
2. Plotting revenge. If a woman decides to stay with her cheating mate, plotting her sex revenge would be first on the list. I’d want my partner to feel the same betrayal they made me feel.
3. The art of forgive and forget. I blame it on the mix of Irish and Italian tempers embedded in my genetic makeup, but I have never been good at the forget part of forgive and forget. If a woman is to stay or go, she must perfect the art of both. You can’t move on (with or without your partner) without forgiving and forgetting.
