111. It’s Over, But I’m Still Stuck: The Ghosts of Infidelity That Won’t Go Away (3/3)

In the final part of our mini-series, we talk about something that many people don’t expect: how the imbalances created by infidelity can linger long after the relationship ends.

Whether it’s guilt, shame, anger, or resentment, the emotional aftermath of infidelity doesn’t always disappear when the papers are signed and the relationship is officially over.

We’ll explore how the ‘ghost’ of the broken relationship continues to show up in your life, influencing how you see yourself, how you approach future relationships, and how you navigate lingering feelings from the past.

Key Takeaways:

The Ghosts of Infidelity

• Why unresolved feelings continue to haunt you, even when the relationship is over.

Lingering Guilt and Shame:

• How the unfaithful partner can struggle with feelings of guilt long after separation.

The Imbalance of Moving On:

• Why one partner might seem to move on easily while the other feels stuck in pain.

Breaking Free from the Ghost:

• How to start reclaiming your life and healing independently.

💬 Reflection Questions:

What part of the past relationship is still haunting you? How can you begin to let go and create space for your future?

Connect with Luke:

• Website: www.lifecoachluke.com

• Instagram: @mylifecoachluk

• Email: luke@lifecoachluke.com

Join the After the Affair community at www.facebook.com/groups/aftertheaffaircommunity

Episode Transcript:

The After The Affair podcast with me Luke Shillings is here to help you process, decide and move forward on purpose following infidelity. Together we'll explore what's required to rebuild trust not only in yourself but also with others. Whether you stay or leave I can help and no matter what your story there will be something here for you.

Let's go! Hello everybody and welcome back to the After The Affair podcast. I'm your host Luke Shillings and today we're listening you're listening to episode number 111. So this episode is a follow-on a little bit from the last two episodes as it happens.

My original plan was to do one episode and then that kind of evolved into two which then has now evolved into three. I don't think there will be a fourth in this particular series however I'm not making any promises. So we're talking about balance and I kind of want to see how this balance lingers in other situations particularly if you have not remained in the relationship that the affair occurred.

You know perhaps you've moved on or at least you think you have. The papers are signed, the boxes are packed and you've tried to leave the past behind you but despite your best efforts something still lingers. A ghost of sorts of a broken relationship that haunts you in ways you didn't expect.

Now this isn't just about missing your ex or feeling nostalgic about the good times. I'm talking about the lingering imbalances that stick around long after you've separated. Resentment, guilt, regret.

They can all act like ghosts showing up uninvited and causing all kinds of chaos in your life. It's like trying to move on with your life but there's this shadow that just keeps following you around whispering reminders of what happened and what you lost and or actually sometimes just in case of what you did. So today I want to talk about why this happens, how these ghosts manifest in different ways and why the separation doesn't automatically mean closure.

So let's start with the most obvious way a ghost can stick around. Unresolved feelings. You know the saying time heals all wounds.

Well that's not entirely true. Time alone doesn't heal anything. Processing and resolving those feelings do.

But when we try to rush through the pain or avoid dealing with it, we seek pleasure to avoid discomfort, those unresolved feelings just have a way of sticking around. A bit like that unfinished business that just won't let it rest. So take for example there's a client of mine, I'll call her Sarah.

Her marriage ended after she found out her husband was having an affair. She was angry, she was devastated and in her words she was done with him. But as the months passed, Sarah noticed that the anger wasn't fading.

It was just morphing into something else. Bitterness, resentment, this constant mental narrative of how could he do this to me? She thought that the divorce would give her freedom, but in reality the shadow of those unresolved feelings kept haunting her. No matter how much she tried to distract herself or focus on new things, the bitterness would just seep back in.

It affected how she saw herself and of course it also affected future relationships. It was like she was carrying around this invisible weight that nobody else could see. The divorce was just a piece of paper.

It was just something that was a formal agreement of dissolution of the marriage. It didn't change any of the feelings associated with it. On the flip side, the ghost doesn't just haunt the betrayed partner.

For the unfaithful partner, the shadow might show up in the form of guilt or shame and that can stick around a long time after the relationship ends. Even when you're no longer together, there's this lingering feeling that you're branded by your past mistakes. It's like you're now defined as the person who cheated.

Even if nobody else is saying it to you, it might be a message that you're carrying yourself. And then you leave yourself in a place where you're unable to shake off the shame of what you did. I once spoke with a man who had an affair which led to his divorce, ultimately.

He wasn't in denial, but he did know he'd messed up. And he owned his actions and he apologised more times than he could count. And even though the relationship was over, he kept feeling like he was marked by it.

Like every new person he met could somehow see what he had done. The shame didn't disappear with the end of the marriage. It just found a new place to live.

It's a tough spot to be in because even if you've done everything you can to make amends, those feelings of guilt can create an imbalance in how you view yourself. And when you see yourself as the villain in your own story, it's hard to move forward with confidence or even to believe that you deserve anything different. And when we have a low level of belief in ourself, our self-worth, then it makes it incredibly difficult to try and portray that out to the real world, to somebody else.

And therefore it becomes harder for other people to be able to see that self-worth too, that worth in you. So it can have this real lasting impact and sometimes just telling yourself that everything's okay and you've moved on and you've made these choices, the circumstances might look very different, but the internal narrative, the internal experience, it remains. Now let's talk about another ghost.

And this one tends to linger for those who share children. Co-parenting. And here's the thing, even when the romantic relationship ends, co-parenting forces you to maintain a connection with your ex.

Now this was something that was very true in my situation. I have spoken about it before, the challenges that I faced when having to re-establish myself, my identity in terms of what that looked like for me, no longer living in the family home and having the kids coming to stay with me. And initially, as painful as it is to admit, initially I felt resentment towards the children.

Not because they'd done anything wrong, of course they hadn't. They were just innocent victims, if you like, of a circumstance. But what it did for me was it reminded me that there was nothing I could do.

I could not stop myself from this woman being part of my life for the rest of my life. And I couldn't just have that clean break that I wanted. I wanted to just walk away, run away.

My father lives the other side of the world, you know, in different circumstances. I might have decided to just, you know, book a plane ticket and disappear over there for six months and just kind of escape it all. But my children meant that I couldn't do that.

And of course, I say it meant that I couldn't. In reality, I didn't want to because my children were obviously very important to me. And trying to be there for them and offer this stability in this new format that existed was something that I absolutely wanted to do.

But it did mean that I couldn't just have this clean cut from the relationship. I couldn't just turn my back on it. I couldn't just bury it away and hope that it would... I could focus on something different and overcome the pain.

And that wasn't the reality of my situation. Now of course, if there are lingering resentments or unhealed wounds, it's like trying to coexist with a ghost in the room. And every time you have to make a decision together as co-parents, it's there, it's present, it's ever-present.

I've heard stories from people who describe this almost surreal experience of interacting with their ex as co-parents while dealing with the shadows of their past relationship. Maybe you're the one who was betrayed and you can't help but feel like every co-parenting conversation is loaded with unspoken accusations. Or maybe you were the unfaithful partner, constantly trying to navigate your ex's anger or mistrust while doing the best for your kids.

It's like a relationship has ended but there's still this lingering imbalance that you can't escape because the ghost just keeps showing up. At parents' evenings, at kids' birthday parties, or even just every time that you exchange the kids for the weekend. It's always there.

It's always haunting you. Moving on, there's another way a ghost can stick around. And this is through the perception of winning or losing, particularly in the case of the divorce.

When a relationship ends, it's easy to see the legal and financial outcomes as some kind of scoreboard. Who got what? Who came out on top? And that's when this weird power dynamic creeps in, leaving one person feeling like they've lost everything, while the other one seems to be doing just fine. And this often isn't just a case of money or logistics or material objects.

It can sometimes just be down to time and responsibility and who is looking after everything. You know, a woman I spoke to recently was dealing with this exact situation. Her ex got the house, the car, and what seemed like a completely fresh start.

Meanwhile, she was starting over, trying to rebuild something from scratch, feeling like she got to, I suppose, got the short end of the stick. This perception of losing created an emotional imbalance that stuck with her, keeping her in a cycle of resentment and self-doubt. It was bitter for her.

It was a bitter experience. And it wasn't just about the material stuff, like I said. It was about feeling like she had lost part of her identity, her sense of security, and her confidence.

But perhaps the most insidious ghost of all is the one that exists entirely in your own mind. The ghost relationship. Even when the physical relationship is over, there's still this internal narrative that keeps you tied to what happened.

It's the memories, the unspoken conversations, the what-ifs and if-onlys that just continually play on repeat. I want you to picture a house. Think of it as your mind, where every room is filled with memories of your past relationship.

The good, the bad, and everything in between. The ghost lives in those rooms and unless you actively decide to change something, it's going to stay there, rearranging the furniture and leaving traces of itself in every conversation you have with yourself about your past. Maybe it's the betrayed partner holding on to their identity as the wronged one, struggling to find a new sense of self beyond being a victim.

Or maybe it's the unfaithful partner, forever haunted by the choices they made, the relationships that they broke, and the people that they hurt. Either way, until you confront that ghost head-on, it's going to keep influencing how you see yourself and the life that you're trying to build. So what do you do when this ghost lingers, or any of these ghosts? I'm not here to give you a step-by-step guide today, but I do want to offer a shift in perspective.

Maybe the goal isn't to completely exorcise the ghost of your past relationship, but to learn how to live alongside it without letting it control your future. Instead of trying to erase the pain or pretend that the past didn't happen, acknowledge the ghost for what it is. It's a reminder of what you've been through, but not a definition of who you are.

Just like memories, ghosts are part of your story, but they don't have to define your next chapter. If you're dealing with lingering feelings of guilt, resentment or regret, let's work on seeing those emotions as signals. Not as punishments or judgments, but instead just as signals of where you might need more healing, more understanding or even just more time.

So if you're feeling haunted by a ghost relationship, whether it's lingering guilt, unresolved feelings or that sense of imbalance, remember this. Ghosts can only stay as long as you keep feeding them. That doesn't mean ignoring what happened or pretending it didn't hurt.

It means acknowledging what's there, processing it and choosing what role is going to play in your life moving forward. Thinking about how you want to exorcise the ghost in your relationship sometimes is something you find difficult to do alone. This is where I can help.

We can help uncover some of the ghosts that exist in your life together. We can put a plan in place to move forward and start to put the steps in place so that you can work your way through your experience, creating a new narrative and not allowing the past to define who you are. So if you want to see what that's like, you want to see what's possible for you as an individual in your situation, then let's talk.

Reach out, visit lifecoachluke.com and schedule a free 30-minute call and we can talk through your situation and put a plan in place. If you'd just like to take this conversation off the airwaves and put it onto something more tangible, then come and join us over in the After The Affair community on Facebook. You can do that by visiting facebook.com forward slash groups forward slash After The Affair community.

I look forward to seeing you there. Okay, thank you ever so much for joining me again on today's episode. Hopefully my voice has returned to something a bit more normal by the next time we speak.