Photo Illustration by Tenae Allison
The birds chirp, the sun shines and everything seems right in the world when you’re in a good relationship. That mystical, cloud-nine feeling makes you feel wonderful and almost invincible, that is until infidelity worms its way into your perfect world – ruining what could have been and leaving you feeling destroyed.
That is what happened to Savannah Svoboda.
After two years in a serious relationship, Svoboda, a sophomore communications and political science major at Colorado State University, returned home from a vacation in Mexico to learn from an acquaintance that her boyfriend had cheated on her while she was gone.
“It was so bizarre because it was a really good relationship,” Svoboda explains. “I didn’t believe the person who told me because we weren’t good friends. I was in denial.”
She confronted her boyfriend about it, who tried to deny the rumor, but after a two-hour battle, he admitted it was true – he did cheat on her.
“His attitude just switched like that, so I knew something was wrong,” Svoboda says, referencing when she first confronted her boyfriend about the rumor.
With this infidelity, their seemingly great relationship of two years ended.
Today, it seems that infidelity is more common, especially with celebrities like Tiger Woods, Madonna and even former president Bill Clinton making headlines for cheating on their spouses. According to Elizabeth Harrison, licensed clinical social worker in Fort Collins, 30 to 50 percent of people have had an affair.
Furthermore, cheating can be very common in college, mainly because many people are not ready for a serious relationship, adds Rachel Isenberg, who is also a licensed clinical social worker in Fort Collins.
In Svoboda’s situation, infidelity stepped into a relationship out of nowhere, but the reasons for cheating vary from person to person.
Isenberg explains that many people feel unimportant or devalued in their relationship and are looking for something new without ending their current relationship, but they still need the current relationship to feel special, even if it’s not fulfilling their needs.
Fort Collins therapist Laura Garrett says others might use cheating to end their relationship purposefully or even as an easy way out to avoid commitment.
“This way the person doesn’t ever have to have the ‘it’s not working’ talk, and he or she can keep all emotions aside,” she adds.
Garrett says this form of a break-up can often create a pattern, where a relationship is more likely to end with cheating if that is how the two people got together in the first place.
So is the saying “once a cheater, always a cheater” true?
Isenberg says no, because people can always learn from their mistakes, understand what exactly they are looking for in life and never cheat again.
But when the door to infidelity has been opened once, it can be easier to open a second time, explains Harrison. The likeliness of a person to cheat on their partner depends on their current relationship values and expectations of what they want from that relationship. She continued on to say for many people, it’s a matter of knowing if they are mature enough to be in a loving relationship and see the long-term effects of their actions.
“Everyone has their own reason [for cheating],” Isenberg explains. “Often times it’s that they feel disconnected with the person they’re in a relationship with and they meet someone else that makes them feel special, which pulls them closer.”
Someone who has experienced this feeling is Brian A., a former CSU international studies major. Brian A. was in a long-distance relationship for five months when he cheated.
“Feeling disconnected [from] my girlfriend and not [having] my needs [satisfied] was the biggest thing,” Brian A. says. “My girlfriend had a lot going on and it was hard for her to show that emotional side.”
When his girlfriend found out he cheated, they decided to salvage their relationship, but only if he cut off all contact with the woman he cheated on his girlfriend with.
“There was a slight trust issue after the first month or so,” says Brian A., who remains anonymous out of respect for his current relationship and the person whom he cheated with. “I had to make that extra effort. It’s not so much of an issue now.”
He adds that he has learned a lot from this experience and is currently working to maintain a strong bond with his girlfriend, who he has now been dating for over seven months. He believes that he will not have any problems remaining faithful in the future.
After someone has been unfaithful in a relationship, Isenberg explains that rescuing a relationship requires both people to reconnect and decide what they’re looking for and to possibly change their expectations for the future. She adds that both people have to be physically and emotionally available.
“When a person is having an affair they are stuck in ‘tunnel vision,’ which means they cannot see the reality of what they’re doing,” Isenberg says. “The fantasy eventually shatters, leaving the problems of the old relationship unresolved.”
Garrett says the way to avoid infidelity is to make sure you’re not getting into a relationship to make yourself complete because, if this is the case, the relationship will never work. She explains the relationship results in one person looking elsewhere.
“I think the biggest component to relationships and their success is both people need to be whole, complete and healthy,” Garrett says. “You have to make yourself feel complete.”
Tags: cheating, college students, infidelity, Volume 5 Issue 2
