After finding out that your spouse has cheated you're an emotional train wreck. What was once solid is now liquid. The pain and suffering you experience are physically draining. The questions that flood your mind are countless. Yet, one question persists above all the rest. Why? Why did they do this to me? Why? Why? WHY!

Lose the Why and Save Your Marriage

Without a doubt the biggest question in my mind, after I found out about my wife's affair, was why. Why did she do this? Why did this happen? Why would she betray me? Why? It was a natural response, after all I deserved to know why this all happened didn't I? The only problem was my wife didn't have an answer. I, of course, didn't believe this at first. After all, she did it, she should know why she did it. She needed to tell me the reason why! It was my right! Yet, no matter how many times I asked or how mad I got she couldn't answer. No matter how many times I rephrased the question, the answer remained the same. She didn't know.

I took me awhile to come to grips with the fact that she really didn't know. It took me even longer to understand that there really was no €why€ at all. There is no singular, pinpoint reason why infidelity happens. If we were going to move forward, I needed to lose the €Why€ and focus on the €How.€ How are we going to rebuild? How are we going to heal? How are we going to change? How? How?

We started answering the €How€ questions by examining these three key areas:

Examining Your Lifestyle
Whether you party like rock stars or are rarely off the couch, keep this question in mind: €Does this lifestyle help promote a healthy marriage?€ If the answer is no, then something has to change. Is the lifestyle you are leading the soul factor as to why the affair happened? No. However, it could be a contributing factor. Lets face it, what you were doing before didn't work. Don't be fooled into thinking that your lifestyle should not be scrutinized. I listed it first for a reason.

Examining Your Friends/Family
Friends and family can be the biggest blessing or the biggest source of drama in your life. You have to decide which one applies to your situation. Ask yourself this: €Do my friends/family help or hinder the marriage?€ Negative people (drama junkies) bring a whole slew of problems with them and these problems tend to rub off on the people with which they come in contact. If you find yourself drowning in a sea of other people's problems it time to make a change.

Examining Your Time/Schedule
Everyone has s schedule to keep and honoring all of your commitments is important. Just not as important as your marriage. The blending of both spouses schedules helps to bring peace into the relationship. Try and make you schedules compliment each other. Plan ahead. Mixing in surprise activities without informing your spouse creates conflict. If you know that a potential conflict is coming up, make sure you communicate that to your spouse. Both spouses can earn more trust and respect by not taking the other person's time for granted. Remember you are a team.

Shifting your focus from the €Why€ to the €How€ is a important step in post--affair recovery. The quicker you start doing this the better. I am of the opinion that the €Why€ really doesn't matter in the long run anyways. What really matters is €How€ you move forward together, as a team committed to improving your marriage. Taking a look at the three areas mentioned above is a great starting point. Just don't stop there, keep the ball rolling in the right direction, continue to investigate parts of your life asking this question: €How can we improve here?€