After listening to a podcast interview with Guy Winch, the author of Emotional First Aid, I ordered and read his book. ​While it does not focus specifically on affair recovery, most of the problems addressed in the book are commonly experienced in the affair healing process. In each chapter, the author (a practicing psychologist) discusses an emotional wound using real-life examples and then offers practical research-based remedies. 

Each of these emotional wounds is covered in a chapter of the book: Rejection, Loneliness, Loss & Trauma, Guilt, Rumination, Failure, and Low Self-Esteem. Anyone struggling to heal from wounds of infidelity would benefit from the instruction and remedies presented by the author.

The Dilemma: Getting to the painful truth about an affair is essential for healing, but the truth also becomes a source of endless agony for many who have been betrayed. So what truth helps? Can some truth actually harm? How can we know the difference?
​

Someone recently asked this question:
"We, the betrayed spouses, experience triggers that make us feel the pain again and again. I wonder about the ones who had the affair. Do they get triggers that make them miss the times with the affair partner?"

​People who have been involved in an affair in which emotional connection was experienced will certainly experience "triggers" after the affair is over. This will be especially true if the affair was discovered and disrupted before it ended on its own.

But let's draw a distinction between memories and triggers. There can be many memories of an affair or the affair partner without having any significant emotion attached to them. It's been more than 20 years since my affair, but certain memories about it still pop into my head (especially considering my line of work). But those memories do not carry a sense of longing... missing the other person.