Recovering from an affair can be excruciating.
It doesn’t matter if you were the one betrayed or the one who did the betraying. Healing can prove to be a difficult journey. And along the path to healing, you will likely feel a great deal of anger after infidelity.
Sometimes, your anger might feel like a need for revenge and other times it could even feel like a rush of humiliated rage. While these feelings are natural, dealing with them in a healthy way might not come easily.
Here are a few tips on what to do with your post-affair anger.
Uncovering Your Anger
If you’re like most people, you probably agree that anger doesn’t often seem to need uncovering. Rather, it sticks out like a sore thumb.
You feel mad, right? Yet, there is more to anger than simply being ticked off.
Anger is often an expression of hurt. In terms of an affair, anger is usually the emotion standing center stage like a powerful singer, but it is not the painful emotion driving the song.
Emotions like fear, hurt, guilt, or inadequacy remain hidden behind the stage curtain, but they are the ones actually writing the harsh notes escaping your angry lips. In other words, anger is simply the emotion that upstages your other emotions most of the time. But those other emotions deserve more attention and anger needs more management.
So, how can you deal with the red-faced musician hogging the stage? How do you find relief?
Understanding Why Anger Isn’t the Problem
To be clear, anger is a normal reaction to an affair, both sides of an affair. An affair is traumatic. So, it’s only to be expected that intense feelings bubble up.
Feeling anger is okay. It’s all okay and it’s all natural.
Still, left unchecked by your internal management system, anger can forge a destructive path. It can be harmful to your mental and physical well-being, it can also be harmful to those around you, as you may say or do things in anger that ultimately destroy the relationship.
In short, what you do with your anger remains the issue. Not the anger itself.
Accepting Your Anger After Infidelity
Changing the past isn’t doable. This means that erasing an affair or its fallout isn’t possible either.
But, changing the future is within your control. And, believe it or not, anger has a lot to do with that.
When it comes to anger after infidelity, it’s important to let it come to you as it will. Respect your feelings and adopt a self-validating approach to these uncomfortable emotions.
You feel them for a reason, so allow yourself to feel them completely.
As well as feeling and validating your anger, make a commitment to expressing it. The hard part is knowing how to express your anger in a harmless way for you and others.
How to Express Your Anger
Expressing your anger might feel like you’re doing something wrong. It might even feel a little forbidden. Yet, when expressed appropriately, it can be very healthy.
What does it mean to express your anger appropriately?
For starters, avoid reacting towards another person in the heat of an angry moment. In fact, intense anger often requires a release far away from other people.
If you’re dealing with a whirlwind of toxic pent-up emotions, write it out. You don’t need spell check or even worry that anyone will be read it. Just write what you feel. Feel free to burn it later after you’ve released what you needed to.
Many times, anger is so overwhelming that you have to physically release it. Things like screaming into a pillow, hitting an old couch cushion, or a brisk walk for few minutes all help to release that steam.
If you’re having a hard time dealing with anger after infidelity, do not hesitate to reach out for help from a counseling professional. A counselor who works with couples and individuals in the aftermath of infidelity can help you navigate this tough time, and support you on your path to healing and helpful expression of your emotions.
Jim Duncan, MA, LPC Associate, is a licensed professional counselor at the Relationship Counseling Center of Austin. He works with couples and individuals to help them heal after relationship infidelity. Contact Jim at 512-270-4883, ext. 117, or request an appointment with him on the RCC Austin Scheduling page.