As a society, we consider infidelity the kiss of death for a relationship, but sometimes it can actually help. Jill, who requested to remain anonymous, was caught cheating on her husband in 2000. Since then, she and her husband have reconciled and built an online community for other couples dealing with infidelity. She shared her story on HuffPost Live.
In 2000, Jill's husband uncovered numerous emails that revealed her affair. "I got caught. My husband had about a little over 10,000 emails that he had printed out, and confronted me," she told host Caitlyn Becker. "And I continued to deny it, regardless that there was proof right there on our dining room table, staring me in the face. That went on for about two or three days of me denying, and then, you know, it just overflowed and it all came out."
The couple stayed together with the help of a therapist who specializes in infidelity and family crisis. "Without her guidance, we would never have reconciled. There's so much emotion and so much anger and unresolved feelings, that you really need somebody that understands how to moderate that and give you tools to hang onto while your life is sinking."
She and her husband also turned to the web for support. "My husband was initially on [a message board] looking to relate to other men. I feel very strongly that there's a big dynamic difference in the genders the way women deal with it and the way men deal with it. Women, you know, they'll run out of the house screaming to anyone who will listen to them, where men, I feel, kind of retreat, and basically are isolated because they just don't want to admit that their wife cheated on them."
Jill and her husband founded SurvivingInfidelity.com to provide a safe haven for couples dealing with infidelity.
"Giving them an anonymous place to go to, where there's no face, no name, no neighbor peeking over the fence or anybody eavesdropping -- it's completely anonymous and I think it gives people a lot more freedom to really express how they're feeling, and then they're surrounded by other people that completely relate to it."