“Why don’t you both take a break from each other?”
-Clueless Counselor
This is one of the dumbest pieces of advice given to a couple dealing with infidelity.
The problems of an infidelity ravaged marriage are not solved by creating more distance and less accountability for the cheater. Both are the last things needed, actually.
A break is a very BAD idea for a couple dealing with EITHER emotional or physical affair(s).
Cheating is harder to do with your spouse in the same room–though, sadly, not impossible as some here can attest. It becomes easier–as far as logistics are concerned–with distance from said spouse. “A break from each other” is an excuse to provide such distance, which is another way to say that such advice–IMO–enables further cheating.
Plus, it creates and furthers the illusion at the heart of the problem–namely,
The LIE that the cheater is single.
This lie does not need reinforcement. It needs undermining.
The cheater needs to be confronted with what he or she did by cheating. It needs to sink in that cheating is completely unacceptable behavior, and something they themselves could have chosen to do otherwise, but didn’t.
They do not need a “permission slip” to run away from the responsibilities of the marriage and the person they just violated by cheating.
*A version of this post ran previously.
