As my colleague Esther Perel has trenchantly observed, you don’t go off in an affair looking for a different person. You go off looking for a different you. And as a therapist working with infidelity, I want to know what avenues of vitality opened up in the illicit relationship in order to bring some of that juice back home.

Inspiring just the right amount of jealousy is a time-tested strategy for marital satisfaction,

This is what’s so destructive about cheating. It’s not about the sex. It’s about the trust that has been destroyed as a result of the sex. Without trust, the relationship can no longer function. So it’s either rebuild the trust or say your goodbyes.