An affair can change a relationship but it doesn’t have to define its future.
Therapy for Affair Recovery.
Online therapy across California and Oregon for couples who are navigating the hurt, disconnection and uncertainty that follows an affair.
You never expected to be here.
Overwhelmed by the weight of what happened and unsure how you’ll ever move past it.
Confused and conflicted, experiencing many emotions at once and not knowing what you want or what comes next.
Hurt, angry, or deeply sad, while also longing for comfort and connection with your partner.
Alone, unsure who you can talk to or where it feels safe to turn for support.
Afraid of judgment, wondering what family and friends will think if they find out about the affair.
Caught between wanting closeness and feeling afraid to reach for it, especially when trust and safety have been shaken.
Blaming yourself, questioning what you did or didn’t do and wondering how you contributed to the problems in your relationship.
Unsure whether staying is the right choice, while also wondering if your relationship can recover and become something good again.
Maybe you’re feeling…
There is hope for your relationship after an affair.
An affair can deeply disrupt a relationship, but it does not have to define its future. Couples therapy can help you and your partner talk honestly about what happened, begin rebuilding trust, understand the patterns that contributed to the difficulties in your relationship, and work toward healing and reconnection.
Using the Gottman Method, I’ve helped couples navigate the pain and uncertainty that follow an affair and begin to find a path forward.
Here’s what we’ll do together.
What to Expect
Session One: Your Story
Our first session will be with you and your partner together. I’ll learn about your relationship from the beginning, including how you met, what brought you together, and the experiences that have shaped your relationship. We’ll begin to understand your story and what brought you to therapy now.
Sessions Two & Three: Individual Sessions
In the second and third sessions, I’ll meet individually with each partner. These sessions give us an opportunity to go deeper into your individual experiences, understand the places where you feel stuck, and explore what you hope to change through therapy.
Session Four: Understanding Your Relationship
We’ll come back together and explore the Gottman Sound Relationship House, a framework for understanding the elements that help relationships become healthy, connected, and resilient. We’ll identify the strengths already present in your relationship as well as the areas that need attention.
At the same time, we’ll begin the work of affair recovery through the Gottman Method’s three stages: Atone, Attune, and Attach.
What we will work on:
There are three stages to recovery
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Atone is the first and often most difficult stage of affair recovery. This is where we begin addressing the pain and impact of the affair. The partner who had the affair takes responsibility for their choices, while the injured partner has space to express the hurt, anger, fear, and questions that naturally follow betrayal.
This stage is about more than an apology. It involves listening, accountability, acknowledgment, and learning how to respond to the pain the affair has caused. The partner who had the affair cannot undo what happened, but there are meaningful ways to take responsibility and participate in repairing the damage.
Atone can be a long process, but it can also create a greater sense of clarity and emotional safety as the couple begins to understand what is needed to move forward.
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Once there is a foundation for addressing the betrayal, we begin looking more closely at the relationship itself. The affair remains the responsibility of the partner who chose to have it, but we can also explore the relationship patterns and circumstances that contributed to the disconnection between you.
Together, we’ll identify the patterns that have caused pain and develop more effective ways of responding to one another. Depending on your relationship, this may include working on communication and conflict, rebuilding friendship and connection, clarifying shared goals and values, and developing new ways of navigating difficult conversations.
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The final stage focuses on rebuilding attachment and connection. We’ll work toward restoring emotional and physical intimacy while paying attention to the ways the affair may have affected your ability to feel safe, vulnerable, and connected with one another.
You’ll learn how to have more meaningful conversations about intimacy, explore what may be getting in the way of connection, and begin creating new experiences of closeness within the relationship.
Moving Forward
Choosing to stay in a relationship after an affair is not easy. Recovery takes time, honesty, and a willingness from both partners to do something different. With the right support and a structured approach, couples can work through the hurt, rebuild trust, and create a relationship that feels more connected and secure.
Heal . Grow . Connect
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Heal . Grow . Connect —