Latest / The Kink Consultant / Why People Cheat and What It Really Takes to Heal with Lauren LaRusso

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Why People Cheat and What It Really Takes to Heal with Lauren LaRusso · The Kink Consultant

0:08
It's the King Consultant podcast where we're turning up the heat
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on all things kink and dating, relationships and pop culture.
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So close the door, plug in your headphones, and let's get down
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to it. Hello and welcome to this week's
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episode of the King Consultant Podcast.
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I have a very special guest this week.
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We have Lauren Larusso, a therapist who specializes in
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infidelity for individuals and couples.
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And when I came across her Instagram account, I was so
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impressed with the work she's doing, the taboo topic she's
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talking about. And I felt a real kinship being
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online and talking about things that can be such a hot button
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issue. So welcome, Lauren.
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Thank you for being here. Thanks for having me.
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I couldn't agree more with that hot button topic.
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Yeah, and I think more people than you'd ever think have been
1:00
touched by cheating, whether they are cheated on the person
1:04
cheating partly because I think it's not being talked about.
1:07
Let's start there though. What do you define cheating as?
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Any kind of emotional, physical, or combined type betrayal of the
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pieces of a relationship that belong exclusively to that
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couple and they are brought outside of the relationship
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without the awareness of one of the members of the partnership.
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It's kind of a broad topic then, right?
1:30
It's in the eye of the beholder many ways.
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It really is in the back, the beholder.
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Honestly, you can talk about what's considered kink and say
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the exact same thing of it is in the eye of the beholder.
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You and I actually are no strangers to cheating.
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I think we've both had partners who cheated on us.
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And I think that's what makes it interesting too, because you're
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not talking about this from like a pedestal where you're looking
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around and just saying like know how to help people through these
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situations. You've actually been through it
1:57
yourself. Was that what kicked off this
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work for you? Definitely.
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And I think there's an amount of compassion, empathy, humility
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that when you bring that to the work as a professional, because
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you've walked that walk and you've walked through that fire
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and come out the other side, that's so invaluable to people
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who are feeling very alone and very isolated, which is how
2:19
these things occur. And when you're speaking out
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about those things, not only from your own experience, but
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from a professional level where you can offer insight,
2:28
education, normalize certain things, that's transformative to
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people. So for me, I would have said I
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was living that white picket fence, 2.5 kids life until it
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absolutely was blown apart by infidelity and my marriage
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ended. I have one child.
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It wasn't the family unit that I had been planning on that I had
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been building towards. And it really pivoted my life
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from that moment. So I was, I was already a
2:57
therapist, I was in private practice that was going great.
3:01
And then this thing happened and ultimately I had to dive into my
3:05
own healing. I mean, you cannot helpfully
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help people when you are still in the throes of your own pain
3:10
and disorientation. So this topic was not something
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I touched until about four years later, when I had gone through
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many rounds of grief change, trauma healing, trauma work,
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understanding, and really just basically metabolizing my
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experience and creating and stabilizing my life anew.
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Then I felt like this tension between myself and the
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experience I'd gone through and the greater world, and knowing
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that I had to start to speak out and do something on a wider
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scale about it because I knew I wasn't the only one by a long
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shot. But why aren't we talking about
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it? As much as it happens, it's a
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real problem. When I really started to dig
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into the numbers, I'm like, how are we all staying so quiet on
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this? We don't like to talk about our
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ugly parts, our vulnerable parts, our shameful experiences,
4:00
the pains that we've endured in our life, as much as we like to
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show and celebrate the parts of us that keep us safe.
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So it's really a safety thing. We want to protect ourselves,
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our bonds. So we tend to self protect
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around things that we don't trust ourselves to understand.
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We don't trust the world to handle and understand well.
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And I really think it's the self fulfilling cycle with
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infidelity, cheating, betrayal and relationships.
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It is so much more common and super common to couples who stay
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together. We see these relationships,
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marriages, 3040, fifty years. Tell me there wasn't betrayal at
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some point by one or both parties in some way.
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Maybe I'm jaded by the work that I do, but it's a long time to
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stay together and never have to go through something significant
4:49
that shakes everything up and causes you to have to deal with
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some crisis in the relationship relationship.
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So we don't talk about it. We look at people, we put them
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on those pedestals. We celebrate the anniversaries
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and then we feel like if and when that happens to us, we've
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failed, we've singularly done something wrong or bad, or we
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are unlovable or imperfect as people or partners.
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But the truth is it is happening out there and people are just
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keeping it within the confines of their little homes privately.
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Because social media is a perfect example is we don't like
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to show the parts of ourselves that we're not proud of that
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feel like failures. And I would say that betrayal in
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a relationship feels like a failure.
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It's not a failure. It's a crisis and an experience
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that you need to get through, grow from, figure out what to do
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about. It's a tremendous heartbreak,
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but it's not a singular failure by any means.
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But I think we see it as that and we really self protect
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around it as a culture, society and individuals.
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Thank you for all of that. I don't go online and talk about
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this even though I'm quite open about other parts of my life.
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I think flipping this on its head a little bit, the person
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who cheats, if you talk about cheating online at all, I've
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even experienced this. Just saying my personal opinion
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is that sometimes people have reasons that they cheat.
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And I'm not saying that it's right or wrong because this is
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even hard for me to say because I know the backlash that comes
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from saying this. I work with a lot of people who
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cheat because people want to explore kink outside of their
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relationship. Either they're too afraid to
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bring it up or they're sorry. I didn't realize how triggering
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this conversation was going to be for me.
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I am sorry. Don't be sorry.
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I mean, that's a good thing. As you spoke I just realized how
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much pain I went through as the cheated on partner that I really
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just brushed over and blamed myself for in many ways.
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Take a second and Amanda, I just want to say that one thing that
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also isn't talked about is the fact that pain, it doesn't ever
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go away. And people want to use the word
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like get over it. Like when will I heal?
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When will I get over it? The answer is never.
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I do this work every day. I'm a therapist.
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I wrote a book on the topic that's coming out next year.
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And still, if I say one thing out of nowhere, I will get
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incredibly emotional because I'm still all heartbroken deep, deep
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down inside, and I'm still traumatized or I'm still
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affected by the way that it's changed my life.
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So don't be sorry for those emotions.
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I've cried on conversations with my book editor, just retelling
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her apart. I was writing.
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It's part of being human. So I actually think.
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Thank you. Good thing to show.
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Thank you for sharing that. Because I think of course what
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really came up is that on some internal level, I think I blame
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myself for the cheating that happened because I'm kinky, my
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partner is not. And I feel like he just felt
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like he couldn't satisfy me. And then he went somewhere else
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where he did feel like he was satisfying the person.
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So it's a very. Complex blame.
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Yeah, it's quite a complex issue.
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What's really interesting though, is as soon as you
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mentioned your partner cheated, if you do say it out loud,
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everyone gets so angry at the cheater and they condemn them.
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And I have a lot of empathy for both sides, even having been
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cheated on. And you don't just deal with one
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side, you help both of them work through what's happened.
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I hope all parties end an affair.
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So I help the affair partner, I help the betrayed, and I help
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the person who's being unfaithful, in addition to a
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fair couples and married couples.
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So my take is that everyone deserves and requires healing.
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How do we heal the whole if we only heal one part of it?
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We don't. We have to let everyone involved
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and affected know that they're not alone, that you don't have
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to sit in shame and silence and that there is a space where you
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can process it safely, get support, get insight, get
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information, and you don't have to stay stuck and isolated.
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But again, that shame piece, we want to blame one person because
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it keeps us safe. But having empathy, that's a
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superpower, right? Like if you want to sit in an
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ivory tower and say that only the person who steps out of the
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relationship is to blame, then there's some deep work ahead of
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you. Let me be clear.
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The person who's responsible for the infidelity is the person who
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stepped out of the relationship. Period, end of sentence.
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And I never want to confuse that.
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But to have empathy is to understand that they're human
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too, just as we are human. And empathy and insight is not
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excuse. They're not the same thing.
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There are certain misconceptions or maybe maybe these are true.
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This this is one that I hear a lot Like oh if someone cheats,
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the relationship wasn't right in the 1st place, it wasn't good.
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But that's in direct opposition of these couples who last for 50
9:43
years. That's not fair, and again,
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that's part of that unilateral cultural assignment that we
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make. We as humans want to tell
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stories so that we can fit things into neat spaces that
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make sense to us, so we can feel more safe and in control of our
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experience. So when we hear things like
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that's what that is, it's let me attach myself to one explanation
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of something that's extraordinarily complex.
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Again, no excuse, but extraordinary, complex and
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individual for each couple and person.
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So no, listen, relationships are complex.
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So if we're saying that the relationship is not meant to be,
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some relationships aren't, but some relationships are as good
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as any will ever get and they're still infidelity or betrayal,
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that's because we're also individuals with agency and we
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don't live in a glass bubble. We experience other people.
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We experience ourselves through the eyes of other people.
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We experience ourselves as part of the greater world.
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And that can be a life force in and of its own, where you are
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pulled out of the relationship, not pushed out of the
10:55
relationship by the relationship being bad by any means.
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11:39
My gosh, you put that so well. And I think that sounds like
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that is the experience of so many just being pulled out by
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the world we live in because our energies mix, we meet other
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people, things happen, and that's living that is life.
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Are there commonalities though? Is there in your work this like
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#1 reason that people cheat? Do you see reoccurring themes
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throughout like most of your clients?
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There are some people who will have that distilled list and I
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really don't. And there are big themes, like
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for example, having an avoidant type relational style that is
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going to be a big vulnerability to infidelity because the
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difference between the person and relationship who goes to the
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mat when they're having disconnection or unhappiness or
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an unmet need or desire, when they turn towards the
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relationship, that's going to be a huge strengthening factor of
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that relationship, a huge protective factor of that
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relationship. When you're avoidant, which many
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people are. We grow up conflict avoidant.
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We grow up learning that we cannot speak our needs, our
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desires, our wants, our feelings that we can't.
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And we're terrified to. We're terrified of that
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experience, whether it's because our partner gets defensive,
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which is normal, or extra defensive, which is maybe not a
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great thing, or because there's conflict, or because it just
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makes somebody else have to experience us more honestly.
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There's a million reasons for that avoidance, but avoidant
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people in relationships are so much more likely to silently and
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unilaterally just go out of the relationship to handle their
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issues instead of towards the relationship.
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That's a huge thing. So there's avoidance as a
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personality style or relational style and attachment style.
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It takes a lot of different shapes.
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And then there's narcissism, personality disorders.
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That's a huge one. There's almost nobody with
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narcissistic personality style or a high conflict personality
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style that isn't going to find fault with their partner enough
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to justify getting their needs met somewhere else.
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And they will never get enough from their partner because they
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can never get enough really from anybody.
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Those are some big ones, but there's a million different
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reasons and that's why doing the individual work is so important.
13:59
Yeah. And all of those are really
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great points. I want to touch on something you
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said about not just the avoidance, but this idea that a
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partner is never going to really accept the honest version of
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themselves. You said a variation of that,
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and I think that stuck out to me because so much of what happens
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in the kink world is we, and I can speak for myself as well.
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We'll have a kink and feel a lot of fear that I won't be accepted
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once I bring it up. So sometimes I will hide it for
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a really long time in the past. Not anymore.
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I will hide my kinks and just bring it up like months into the
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relationship when other parts were established enough and
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there was a fear of rejection for that entire time until I
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brought it up. And that's one of the things
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that is common in the work I do. People who are so afraid to
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bring up what they want or they've been rejected once by
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their partner. So instead of going to the mat
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like you just described, sometimes it feels easier.
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And one of our justifications, and I'm not saying this is
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narcissism, is they don't want this anyway and I want the
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relationship, but they don't want to do this with me.
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So it's OK that I'm doing with someone else.
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It's not like sex where they want sex they don't want to
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spank me for. I use that example because I
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like to be spanked. So like, let me go somewhere
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else. Define that.
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Have you worked with any couples who have kink as one of the
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reasons they leave to cheat? Oh, time and again and again,
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it's on this spectrum, right? So I'm not a kink expert by any
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means, but it's on a spectrum. And really it comes back to that
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rejection piece. Either I don't want to be
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rejected by my partner or my spouse, so I'm not even going to
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bring this here. Or there was one time when I
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said spank me and they said, EW, what?
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I'm not going to do that. And immediately I felt filled
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with shame and I shut down, and I never said it again.
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And then I brought it somewhere else.
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We are more emotionally fragile than we want to ever acknowledge
15:43
and admit to ourselves, and rightfully so.
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Why is there a whole world of vulnerability research that got
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so huge in the past decade or two?
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Because being vulnerable is so scary.
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And we certainly struggle to be most vulnerable in the places
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where we have the most intimacy, our marriage, and our lasting
16:02
partnerships. So that rejection piece is huge
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and I really appreciate how you isolated this one piece where
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someone actually thinks that they're like protecting their
16:12
relationship or saving their partner or their spouse from
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having to even be uncomfortable by going and getting their needs
16:21
met somewhere else. There's this backwards inverted
16:24
logic where it's I just don't bother them with this thing that
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I know they don't want. Then I'm actually stabilizing my
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relationship. That is something I do hear a
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lot, and it's tough because I understand on a very core desire
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level of like how deeply it's needed from what I want.
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But with vulnerability, in order to be vulnerable, you need to
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create a safe space where you feel comfortable enough.
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Is that some of the work you do helping couples get back to a
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repair stage, creating that safety to open up?
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Yeah, I do. And frankly, I work probably
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more with unfaithful spouses than any other demographic.
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The couple's work. When you're dealing with
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infidelity now, you've created a whole other problem.
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And so the infidelity itself becomes the greatest issue.
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You can't even touch those other issues, like getting your sexual
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desires explored or growing. You're not growing and building
17:19
anything in the relationship when you've had a crisis that
17:21
tears everything down. You're really in triage mode.
17:25
So my work is a lot of that triage mode.
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But what I definitely do is I encourage honesty.
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I think that honesty is the antidote to any relationship.
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That's the fastest way to find out if someone's going to meet
17:37
you, where you need to be met, or whether they can't or they
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won't. But if we're not honest, we will
17:42
never find out. We will make a decision inside
17:44
of ourselves before we will ever have the opportunity to find out
17:48
from the other person. So there's no safeguard against
17:50
infidelity. But I think if you can start
17:52
practicing honest in your relationship, that's where the
17:55
good stuff happens. Now you have to be safe and
17:57
honest. You have to be a safe person to
17:59
be honest with, and you have to be safely honest with the other
18:02
person. Let's say you're having a
18:04
conversation about sexual desire.
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Don't shame your partner. That's unsafe communication.
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But to say like, babe, that's not my thing.
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And like, I hate to say that because I wish I could be freaky
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in that way, but I'm like finding myself a little like
18:20
down around it. I'm a little embarrassed around
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it. Don't shame them.
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Just own what's coming up for you.
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And then you can say, so how do we work with that?
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Is that something you need or is that something we can shelve or
18:31
come back to later or not do and you'll be OK with and having
18:35
those kind of conversations? That's a negotiation.
18:37
And partnerships are negotiation.
18:40
So we're not taught these things.
18:42
We're not taught that relationships are supposed to be
18:44
negotiation of needs and wants, so instead we do things like how
18:47
could you want that? And then the rest is history.
18:50
So spot on. We are not taught these things.
18:52
In fact we are taught the exact opposite.
18:54
I am supposed to find my Prince Charming and he's supposed to
18:56
step into my life and know everything I want naturally and
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we're going to live happily ever after.
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So I'll sit here in my ivory tower waiting for him to crawl
19:04
up. That is the story we're told and
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I think so many of us still hold on to it.
19:09
So when something like this happens or when we do feel kinky
19:12
and we're afraid, it just feels, oh, this is wrong.
19:15
It's not the right thing for me just because this one piece
19:18
doesn't match up. Yes.
19:20
And I think that's really relatable to a lot of people and
19:22
how we end up in situations, not just infidelity, not just being
19:26
cheated on or cheating, just being kinky and being scared to
19:29
bring it up. It's that embarrassment of who
19:31
we are that might not be accepted.
19:33
That's not the storybook ending. The parts of ourselves that
19:37
we've learned aren't invited to the table, we tend to banish.
19:42
And then they come up because they will.
19:44
Oh, and we don't know what to do with them and we can't bring
19:46
them in. And I deal with this a lot.
19:48
I'm curious to see if this comes up in your work where someone
19:51
enters a relationship almost dishonestly from the beginning.
19:55
And I think you alluded to this as like you bring it up later.
19:58
Yes. But they get married under this
20:01
guise of not having any desires, not seen as on the fringe or any
20:06
needs or wants, but they keep those a secret.
20:09
And. Then five, 1015 years later,
20:13
when they have an affair or they've been seeing a mistress
20:17
or getting their needs met, their sexual desires met
20:20
somewhere else and it's found out.
20:23
They say I wasn't honest with you from the beginning.
20:25
It's not your fault because I didn't even show you this part
20:28
of myself. And that's huge because it feels
20:31
like this betrayal of I married someone that I thought I knew,
20:34
but I was never going to know you because you always hid that
20:37
part of yourself. Oh, yeah, so it's 5050.
20:40
Some people, they just realized later in life, they're 50 plus
20:43
years old, married in their 20s and just never even thought they
20:46
took their role that society told them like, you're the man,
20:49
you go get the job and you provide for your family.
20:51
Never thought about their own needs in any other way.
20:53
And then their wife is might even be open to it, but it's not
20:57
something then they felt comfortable bringing up.
20:59
But then, yeah, I think I'm going to own up to that.
21:01
I am divorced. I was married.
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And what I did was I pretended it wasn't that big of a need,
21:07
but I was also telling myself that I was like, I don't need
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this. Like, yeah, it happens that way.
21:11
And then yeah, you're not your full self coming into
21:14
partnership because you're not accepting yourself too.
21:16
Exactly. And I think most of us are
21:19
walking around in that state, myself included.
21:21
It's what it is to be human. How can we know ourselves fully?
21:25
That's impossible. How can we live into all of our
21:28
parts of ourselves immediately? We change, we grow, we evolve,
21:32
we experience ourselves differently.
21:34
Our needs and desires change and evolve.
21:36
And that's shaky ground for a relationship.
21:38
We're either gonna grow and negotiate this thing to together
21:41
or we're not. And that's where I meet people
21:43
ultimately. But I also want to say that a
21:46
lot of times people think they have expressed themselves as
21:49
well. But really it was once or really
21:51
it was like a whisper or really right.
21:54
And they're like, well, then that one time.
21:56
So I just decided forever. And then the affair is
21:59
discovered or the kink is revealed or whatever.
22:01
And it's like, I told you that I wanted that once like 10 years
22:06
ago. And I didn't realize it was that
22:07
big of a deal. So I said no.
22:09
And I thought we moved on. Be louder, be more insistent
22:13
with your desires, be more honest, be more open, be more
22:17
vulnerable. Because ultimately it's going to
22:19
catch up with you. So a whisper is not enough.
22:22
A complaint is not a request. All of these things were not
22:26
taught. Really catch up with us in the
22:28
end. Like that, honestly, as you were
22:30
saying this, yes, this is where the honesty piece plugs in
22:33
perfectly. We're growing as people.
22:34
We don't know every part of ourselves.
22:36
So if you practice honesty continuously, when these new
22:39
parts come up, the feelings or desires surge within you.
22:41
If you've already been practicing honesty, it's a
22:44
natural conversation. And to your point, please do not
22:47
hint at your kinks. Please do not mention them.
22:50
Once you have to come to the table and truly express
22:52
yourself, explain how important it is to you because that's
22:55
giving your partner the full picture.
22:57
If they understand this is something, any serious
22:59
conversation, you're going to sit down and have a serious
23:01
discussion. If this is a need you have that
23:04
you haven't previously disclosed, bringing that level
23:06
of seriousness and weight to the discussion is important.
23:10
So I'm you have. To risk the relationship because
23:13
you're going to end up risking it in more devastating ways.
23:16
And I think we don't want to take that risk.
23:18
We want to stay safe. And then ultimately, it's going
23:20
to come back to you later. That is exactly it.
23:24
Thank you for saying that, Lauren.
23:25
It is exactly that. I think some of us are so risk
23:29
averse that we don't even realize what we're risking by
23:32
being risk averse. And I think.
23:33
Well said, well said. Love that we'd rather take the
23:36
risk in private. Oh yes.
23:38
Right, to take a risk with someone who knows us and could
23:41
reject us or judge us or shame us or know us more fully and
23:47
then not like it. That is the scariest risk to be
23:49
vulnerable in our closest places.
23:52
That's what people struggle with and that's what leads to a lot
23:55
of infidelity. I guess also to come full circle
23:57
to that earlier question is being vulnerable, being real,
24:00
being honest, being loud and persistent about what's non
24:04
negotiable for you? What's so important to you that
24:07
is so important. It is so essential in having a
24:11
relationship. That's what everyone really
24:13
wants, which is to be themselves and to be loved and known by
24:16
another person. And that's all all any of us
24:19
really crave is to be known and loved for exactly who we are.
24:23
But then we don't let other people even know us, because
24:25
sometimes we're afraid to even know ourselves.
24:27
That is OK. So that might be at the core of
24:30
it. And I think that is something,
24:31
even if infidelity isn't something that we're
24:33
considering, that hurt and pain and fear, I believe is universal
24:38
even for the securely attached type of person that fear exists,
24:42
Right? Yes.
24:43
Oh my God. And to the point of we're never
24:45
all healed and all that stuff, I have done so much work on myself
24:49
and I would say I am very securely attached and the idea
24:52
of my partner leaving me will flatline me until I gather
24:56
myself again and go. If that ever happens, you're
24:58
going to be OK. You're going to be OK.
25:00
You've done this before. Nothing is forever that could
25:03
happen. But the visceral fear we carry
25:05
inside of abandonment, we're born with that.
25:08
And so we're taught that to be abandoned or left by the people
25:11
that we are bonded to, that's death that feels like a living
25:15
death. So it's enough to bring anybody
25:17
to their knees and it does. And so there's none of us high
25:20
and mighty and walking around. Oh, I just teach other people to
25:23
do this. I don't have these feelings.
25:26
I'm sort of like you getting emotional at the beginning of
25:28
this podcast or me literally, if I don't hear from my partner on
25:31
an evening we don't live together.
25:33
I find myself going to that place that I went to 8 years ago
25:35
in my marriage where I was being lied to and gaslit.
25:39
He's not doing any of that, but I'm human and that stuff lives
25:42
inside of me and I have to work through that.
25:45
But the fear of abandonment and the fear of being hurt and
25:48
rejected and shown that mirror that we're not good enough.
25:51
Oh God, I can't think of anything much more painful than
25:54
that. No, it's so painful and you say
25:56
being shown a mirror, but I'm realizing when you said those
25:58
words, I carry that fear as well of what if another person, I'm
26:02
not in another relationship yet, but it's if I'm left again, my
26:05
immediate fear is then everyone is going to know I'm not worthy
26:08
because everyone's going to think it's my fault that people
26:10
people keep leaving. And it's such an internalized
26:13
fear of, oh, other people are going to judge me and think it's
26:16
my fault. It's almost to the point that
26:18
I've internalized that it is my fault.
26:20
The fear is other people seeing it right.
26:22
I was just gonna say that really, deep down inside, we
26:25
fear we're unworthy. So if it happens again, that's
26:28
just a reinforcement of our deepest seated fear that really
26:31
we're leaveable, like everyone else deserves a relationship and
26:35
fidelity and love, and we somehow are unfit or unchosen
26:41
for that, and we're going to be left and for other people to
26:44
know that too. It's just salt in the wound.
26:47
But really, it's a deep fear we're carrying around.
26:49
But to your point, flatlining and just realizing also, I have
26:53
survived this already. Like it wouldn't be pleasant to
26:56
survive it again, but I have that strength within me too, as
27:00
do many of us, all of us even. Yeah, I know it's all individual
27:03
work, but do you have advice for people say we're there are
27:07
listeners here who are currently exploring like outside of a
27:11
marriage, it's infidelity, It's that betrayal of their partner
27:14
doesn't know. Is there a specific place you
27:16
tell them to start? Or if they want to get out of
27:18
this situation, what options are available to them?
27:22
Honesty, so I don't mean full honesty, but but my work with
27:26
someone like that is begin in 1° increments to bring yourself
27:31
into your relationship at home. Because I guarantee you that's
27:35
going to begin slowly to allow you to meet the very things that
27:40
you're afraid of meeting, that you're running from through what
27:42
you're doing. And that's what's going to
27:44
happen anyway. But in a catastrophic dumpster
27:47
fire, car crash, disaster, if and when what you're doing over
27:51
here is discovered. So why don't we just work
27:55
backwards from the outcome and let's begin to be more honest at
27:59
home. Let's begin to have the
28:00
conversations that we're not having because we're doing it
28:03
over here. Let's begin to explore and
28:06
gently challenge the homeostasis of our relationship because what
28:11
you will find is what would happen anyway.
28:14
But our spouse, our partner deserves to know what they're up
28:18
against or dealing with or to opt in or opt out or even have
28:21
those conversations. But 9.99% of the time those
28:26
conversations are not being had. They're just being determined by
28:29
the person who stepped out that they don't belong at home.
28:31
So what happens is that when the thing, let's say it's kink that
28:36
someone's exploring outside of their marriage, when that thing
28:39
is discovered, that's when you know what your relationship
28:42
really is. The spouse is either going to go
28:44
to the mat, the betrayed spouse or not.
28:47
But also most of the time they go to the mat for the
28:49
relationship. So let's start inviting that
28:52
process so that we allow the unknowing spouse to opt into
28:56
their relationship proactively instead of reactively.
28:59
I just need a second for that because you are so right about
29:02
it that for so many people, part of the excitement of, oh, this
29:05
new person is discovering me and learning so much about me.
29:08
But you do have the opportunity to let your spouse learn this
29:11
new part of you too. I know you're the expert, but in
29:14
my experience with King specifically is bring a lot of
29:17
patience to that too. To your point, you don't just
29:19
whisper it. You don't just say it once you
29:21
make it a serious think. It's so easy to just think, oh,
29:23
they rejected me. This is why I'm having an
29:24
affair. This is why I'm exploring it
29:26
elsewhere. We need to bring patience to
29:28
that conversation because one conversation, especially with
29:31
kink, it's a complex topic. And I'm sure there are so many
29:34
complex topics, but one conversation probably isn't
29:36
going to do it, and it's going to require patience, that one.
29:39
That's why I said one. Yeah, 1 degree 1°.
29:42
One degree, 1° at a time, and don't be so fragile about it.
29:46
And if you are, which many people are, there's shame work
29:50
to be done there. There's shame work to be done
29:52
for all of us. But be doing your own work.
29:55
There's a lot of resources out there to help you gain the
29:58
courage to be more vulnerable in conversation, in relationships.
30:01
Because again, these are things that we were not modeled nor
30:04
taught, and we need to learn them as adults now.
30:07
We're not little anymore and we don't have to act in those
30:10
adaptations ways, but we do have to hold ourselves accountable to
30:13
be courageous in our relationships.
30:15
And sometimes it takes the discovery to dock everybody out
30:20
of their complacency as well. So sometimes it's 1%, one
30:23
degree, 1% goes, yeah, little shifts.
30:26
But ultimately the wake up call, you know, it's not happening
30:29
because it's not enough to shake somebody into realizing that
30:32
their relationship is really in crisis.
30:35
That's where sometimes they do encourage people to say our
30:38
relationship is in crisis. I'm not OK here.
30:40
We need to front load those conversations a lot more often
30:43
because we're not OK. We're having an affair, we're
30:46
sleeping with someone else, we're exploring our kink.
30:48
We're being more honest in the dishonest relationship than
30:52
we're being at home. Our spouse deserves to know that
30:55
the relationship is in crisis so they can figure out what their
30:58
response to it is. Yeah, that's how you
31:00
consensually go about it. I am smiling because when you
31:04
talked about shocking people awake, what you did when you
31:06
said don't be fragile about it is shocking people awake and
31:09
away. And I think sometimes we can be
31:11
a little bit soft on people and be like, oh, they're going
31:13
through a lot. But your point is exactly right.
31:16
Hey, don't be fragile. And if you are, that's OK.
31:19
But you have some work to do. There's some shame in there.
31:21
Dig in there. I think that's something we got.
31:24
Landing the responsibility to your partner, because again,
31:27
that's you keeping yourself safe and being risk averse.
31:29
Oh, it's their responsibility to receive this?
31:32
Well, yes, that's part of a relationship, but it's your
31:36
responsibility to communicate and be honest and give them time
31:40
to adjust to what you're saying or give them resources and give
31:43
them the opportunity to learn or explore or just wrap their mind
31:46
around it. But unless they know what
31:48
they're dealing with, that's not a fair fight.
31:50
Like it's just not fair. So I think that we're not taught
31:54
to be courageous in relationships.
31:57
And ultimately, it takes us losing them sometimes to learn
32:00
what kind of work we have to do to be more courageous.
32:03
And some people never do that work, and that's OK.
32:05
A lot of people don't want to do the work.
32:07
It's very scary, it's very confronting.
32:09
And frankly, some people aren't interested, and that's OK.
32:12
But we're here for the folks who are.
32:13
And I would say it's a life well lived when you're willing to
32:16
lean into that space. I completely agree.
32:19
I think that the regrets people end up having are the things
32:21
they didn't do or the things they didn't say.
32:23
And so much of the important part of that is saying it
32:26
honestly and showing up honestly, showing your true
32:28
self. You mentioned resources and I
32:30
want to call out that you provide so many great resources.
32:34
So if people go to laurenlarusa.com, you have tons
32:37
of resources available for I think every party involved in an
32:41
affair situation. And I had a look at them
32:43
earlier. I think that they are a great
32:44
place for so many people to start.
32:45
So I would encourage anyone who is in the throes of it is still
32:49
healing from it. Like today I learned wow, a year
32:52
on, I'm not as OK as I thought I was.
32:55
And I want to go revisit some of those resources because I think
32:58
I have some fragility to work on in order to show up in my next
33:02
relationship fully and trusting. OK, so that's why I say that you
33:05
have so many resources. And if anyone is affected by
33:08
cheating in any way at all, whether you are the affair
33:11
partner or it's happened to you, honestly, if you're just curious
33:14
about it, I think it's worth diving into some of these
33:16
resources so you can go to Lauren, the dot com and start
33:19
your journey there. Thank you for saying that.
33:21
It's funny how you say even you're thinking about it.
33:24
That seems weird. What do you mean you're thinking
33:25
about it? Most people aren't thinking
33:26
about having an affair. You'd be surprised how many
33:29
people reach out to me going. I was on the cusp or I was
33:33
starting to think I'm bored. This marriage has been 30 years.
33:36
Can I do this forever? And I saw your stuff and I
33:38
realized what I was about to step into because what I do on
33:42
Instagram and what I do in my public education work is I
33:45
basically show people what happens.
33:48
I show people the things that they would have to actually live
33:51
into if they did it themselves. And so they're getting that
33:54
opportunity to see something that's come full circle to the
33:57
beginning of this podcast. People don't talk about and
33:59
people don't see. So when I give you that window,
34:02
now you can make some better informed decisions like, wait,
34:04
I'm going to break my heart later when I have to choose
34:06
between relationships. I don't know that I want to do
34:09
that or, you know, it's going to cause trauma to my spouse and
34:11
kids. Let me just pause here.
34:13
And the work that I do in the education I do is not with any
34:16
kind of agenda, then presenting what is and allowing people to
34:20
make decisions for themselves about what that means for them
34:23
and to them. And I think that's all any of us
34:26
can do. It's a shame.
34:27
Free space. It's a judgment free space.
34:29
And one thing that I'm really proud of that I launched
34:31
recently are memberships. So there's a betrayed partner
34:34
membership that's really active. It's a beautiful group of people
34:37
who are really committed to working through their pain
34:40
points, understanding themselves better because of what happened,
34:43
no matter if they're staying together in their relationship
34:46
or healing alone. That's a hugely supportive
34:48
community. And then I have a community for
34:50
folks who are in an affair and they're either trying to end it
34:54
or trying to decide whether to commit to it or trying to decide
34:57
what led them to it. All different folks are in their
35:00
affair partners and married unfaithful partners alike just
35:03
being honest in that space about their challenges and where they
35:06
found themselves. And so those are tremendous
35:08
resources that I'd recommend and they're on my website as well.
35:11
Thank you for mentioning those because I remember seeing that
35:13
in one of the things that I think I would really encourage
35:17
everyone to just go check out your Instagram because the
35:20
emotional vulnerability and raw honesty you bring in that five
35:23
years in the future view you're able to give people of like if
35:26
you take one of these options, this is where you may end up
35:29
something that sticks with me. If you are the person having an
35:32
affair with someone who's married and you're the single
35:33
party, it's oftentimes they continuously try and stop, but
35:37
get pulled back into that scenario and that cycle.
35:40
It sounds scary, the idea that I'd want to leave and would just
35:44
keep getting pulled back in. And that content is what spoke
35:47
to me the most when I saw it because I'm not in that
35:49
situation. It hasn't been put in front of
35:51
me. But the empathy I felt for these
35:53
people that you work with who are going through this, that's
35:56
tough, especially. So.
35:57
Are the other partner be married?
36:00
Oh, you've bonded to somebody and you have hope for a
36:02
relationship. That person's not available to
36:05
you and then they're on vacation with their family.
36:07
Or then it's your birthday and you're alone.
36:09
Or then it's New Year's and they're with their wife at a
36:13
party or their husband at a party.
36:15
Whatever the situation is, those early acts of chemistry and
36:19
connection will bring you there because it's so easy to feel
36:23
that spark with somebody or slowly move into that space of
36:26
connection. Maybe it's a colleague, maybe
36:28
it's someone at the gym, someone that used to regularly, maybe
36:31
it's someone you just met in the wild and you're like, Oh my God.
36:33
But they're vulnerable in their marriage for whatever reason.
36:37
And they present as a little bit more available than they really
36:40
are. And it can lull someone into a
36:43
sense of like, well, this is temporary until they can address
36:46
what's going on at home and leave their marriage.
36:48
So when we put the cart before the horse, unfortunately there's
36:52
a lot of heartbreak involved because that person needs to end
36:55
their marriage before they can be in a relationship with you.
36:58
And unfortunately, the affair itself makes that a lot harder
37:02
than being in isolated pain of relationship loneliness or
37:06
dysfunction. It tends to stabilize the
37:08
marriage and make the partner less likely to leave overall
37:11
because they're actually getting all of their needs now.
37:14
And nobody in an affair will admit to that.
37:16
They'll say no, no, this is so painful.
37:18
But the pain of leaving, the pain of having the hard
37:20
conversations, the pain of deciding if you're going to end
37:24
the affair or end your marriage, that's the pain that's being
37:26
avoided. So the pain of being in the
37:28
affair is preferable to the pain of actually choosing.
37:31
So there's a lot of dynamics. No one talks about, no one on
37:34
tax, and that's what we're here for.
37:36
And I'm glad you're doing that too, because it's just so
37:38
necessary. Cheating is something that does
37:41
occur in the kink world and I do work with couples who they have
37:44
repaired from it. Like often they'll probably go
37:46
to Someone Like You do that repair work and then when the
37:48
spouse who had been betrayed as OK, I'm gonna try now I
37:51
understand how important it is to them.
37:52
Then they come to me and I wish they had just all come to me
37:54
first before that cycle of pain and avoidance that is so easy to
37:59
get sucked into. Like I have 0 judgment on it
38:02
because of that. I'm like, I understand we're
38:04
avoiding facing ourselves sometimes because that's really
38:07
hard to do and. Yes, my therapist said early on
38:10
change either comes from inspiration or desperation.
38:13
And in my opinion, the change that comes from desperation,
38:16
that's the most transformative pain.
38:18
And so there's a reason we find people and people find us in
38:22
their depths of despair, because we need to be in so much pain to
38:27
be motivated to find a way out of that pain.
38:29
Otherwise, the change that comes out of inspiration, that can be
38:33
really beautiful, but I don't know that it's as visceral.
38:36
And I think we deal with the visceral stuff.
38:38
Definitely not as visceral. It's because when it comes from
38:41
desperation, it's dirty, it's raw.
38:43
That when it comes from inspiration, there's a beauty to
38:46
it because it unfolds in a time that is you're available for,
38:49
whereas desperation is a push. Right.
38:51
Well said. Lauren, thank you so much for
38:53
coming on. This conversation was even more
38:55
than I imagined it could be because it just obviously hits
38:59
so many levels personally, but also I have the opportunity to
39:02
work with clients on as well. But yeah, thank you for
39:05
providing the service you do all of the resources, the amazing
39:08
free content you're putting out on Instagram.
39:10
As another content creator, I understand sometimes it's just
39:14
you were just there. It's a act of love purely just
39:16
to share this information one. 100% thanks, I'm so glad you
39:19
found me. It's so nice to talk with you.
39:21
So I'm here now, you know? We'll be in touch anyway.
39:24
We'll be doing this again. Yeah.
39:25
And for all the listeners, if you have any questions, comment
39:27
them below. Lauren, you're definitely coming
39:29
back on. We have so much more to discuss.
39:31
I'd be so glad. Thanks so much, Amanda.
39:34
Thank you for being here. It was such a pleasure talking
39:37
with Lauren Larusso. This topic hits close to home
39:39
for so many people and I'm happy to share her new book, Beyond
39:42
Infidelity. How to Turn the End of Your
39:44
Relationship into the Beginning of your Life is available for
39:47
pre-order today. In this book, Lauren helps you
39:50
stabilize, reclaim your confidence, and rebuild your
39:52
life from the ground up. If you've ever been through
39:55
infidelity or love someone who has, this is the book you need
39:58
to read. Head to the show notes to
40:00
pre-order your copy of Beyond Infidelity Today.
40:04
If you enjoyed this episode, don't forget to subscribe, leave
40:07
a review and share it with anyone who might find it
40:09
interesting. And if you have any questions or
40:11
topics you'd like me to cover in future episodes, feel free to
40:14
reach out. e-mail info@thekingconsultant.com.
40:18
Until next time, keep on kinking on.