"Betrayal & Infidelity Q&A: The Pain, the Healing, and the Hard Truths"

In this Q&A episode, Shazmeen Bank delves into the complexities of infidelity, betrayal, and the emotional turmoil that follows. She addresses listener questions about the pain of being cheated on, the impact of infidelity on children, and the importance of self-worth and accountability in relationships. Through personal stories and insights, she emphasizes the need for open communication, healing, and the courage to move on from unhealthy relationships. Shazmeen encourages listeners to prioritize their emotional health and to seek relationships that foster growth and mutual respect.

Takeaways

• Infidelity reveals deep wounds and unhealed parts of ourselves.
• Communication is key in addressing infidelity and rebuilding trust.
• Children are deeply affected by their parents' relationship dynamics.
• Healing from betrayal requires self-reflection and personal growth.
• It's important to set standards for honesty and accountability in relationships.
• Repetitive cheating indicates a need for serious self-evaluation.
• Self-worth is crucial in navigating relationships after betrayal.
• Understanding attachment styles can help in relationship dynamics.
• Moving on from long-term relationships can be challenging but necessary.
• Bravery is required to lead relationships towards healing and growth.

Thank you for listening to this Q&A episode on betrayal, infidelity, and the road to healing. it means so much to me to have you trust me read your questions and answer them. Your questions allow so many scared to ask, listen and feel seen and not alone in their problem. 

This podcast is to grow a community of people that feel safe to share and grow. 

 If this episode spoke to you, or if you’re sitting in the middle of heartbreak right now, please know this: you’re not alone, and you don’t have to carry this pain by yourself.

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I’ll see you in the next episode.

Chapters

• 0:00 Understanding Infidelity and Betrayal
• 14:48 Repetitive Cheating and Its Consequences
• 23:37 The Impact of Infidelity on Children
• 37:21 Emotional Responses to Betrayal
• 42:42 The Impact of Cheating on Relationships
• 48:32 Navigating Complex Relationship Dynamics
• 54:52 Reigniting Relationships Through Communication
• 1:04:06 The Importance of Self-Love and Validation

Transcript

Shazmeen Bank (00:05.602)
Welcome back to another episode of Life Better in the Love Better podcast. So if anyone's looking to listen to the episodes, it's Love Better podcast, but every Thursday we do the Life Better segment where I answer all of your questions that you send in from TikTok, emails and Instagram. On Monday, I posted an episode on infidelity and cheating and

how the betrayed person can hold a lot of space for the person they have betrayed. The person that is in turmoil, the person that's hurting, the person that thinks they're a psychopath because their partner thinks you're unrelatable. One day you're hot, then you're cold, you're screaming, you're shouting. They're parts of your personality I do not understand because normally you're calm, you're collected, you're the partner that is the glue in that relationship, you're level-headed.

And when someone cheats on you and you've never had a chance to have all your questions answered or resolved, it's really, really painful. And when you've not had someone cool your heart, the flames down of suspicion and put an end to the lies and you're constantly thinking, are they cheating? Are they not? You've not come together as a couple professionally and properly to make that relationship really work. You're doing the best you can as

the couple you are, can leave you feeling alienated in your pain. so I posted, so that was the episode we dealt with on Monday. And for anybody that's been betrayed or you're a couple wondering, how do we make this relationship work? Can it? The episode on Monday will really be a beautiful guide to both of you on the three steps. Just start.

before beginner level even to start creating some room in the relationship to open up for conversation. getting into your questions that I really loved, somebody wrote in relation to that saying, she's only admitting to what I have uncovered. She's not come voluntarily to come clean and to try to regain my trust. She's completely stopped communicating to avoid giving more incriminating information.


Now this is painful and so hard to be in the cat and mouse game where you've caught the person, you have the proof, but you don't have all of it. And in this digital age, it's so easy now. You're not in a place where you catch the person with lipstick on the collar and they turn around and they can brush it aside to, went to see my mom after work or now in the digital world, there's an entire footprint.

The lipstick on the collar is the receipt. The lipstick on the collar is getting into their password and checking out their phone and finding a history to an affair that's been happening or just emotional texts that have been sent or the sexting or the discovery of an entire other family you didn't know about. And so when you're in this cat and mouse game of she's only admitting to

what you're showing. There's the only admission coming to, okay, wait, what did you catch? What did you learn? What did you find on my phone? What did someone tell you? What's the proof you have? So in my mind, I know where to not go. What information to not reveal. If you've only caught 20 % of my texts, then I know how to formulate the lie around the 20 % of that text. This is because your partner unskillfully

doesn't want to lose you. And now I know, wait a second, I understand the whole, if they don't want to lose me, Shazam, why did they do this in the first place? Because as human beings, we are in a world, all eight billion of us in such complex situations, we have never been taught how to communicate properly, how to repair conflict properly. We've watched our parents cheat. We've watched our parents have affairs.

We've watched our mothers and fathers grow up in toxic environments or never have their emotional needs being satisfied. We are so complex in what we want, in what we need, and there's a huge percentage of us that are not securely brought up. We've not been taught how to address emotion, how to hold on to loyalty, how to have our virtues, our principles, and our values match and align with our character. And we're not going to pair

Shazmeen Bank (04:54.187)
perfectly with everybody secure. A lot of us anxiously attached are going to pair with avoidantly attached people that are fearfully avoidant or dismissively avoidant. Secure people are this amazing, beautiful pairing we can have in our lives, but until we grow, until we heal, we're not at a standard and a level where we're out putting out this

Beacon saying I'm healed and the beacons only attracting secure people so You are gonna be in a relationship with someone who's unskillfully trying to hold on to you They they don't walk away They want to go through this cat-and-mouse loop with you because they love you unskillfully not behavior We condone, but we start to understand where the behavior stems from so

her not communicating anymore, your partner avoiding you because they want to avoid more incriminating information is because they're terrified of what parts of myself are going to be exposed. What parts of myself do I not want to defend and deal with? What parts of this infidelity could bring out and destroy my image, not only with you, but my image in society? Infidelity...

breaks a part of you open. It reveals parts of yourself you didn't know you had to see. It shows you wounds deep into your childhood that you never thought your behavior stems from. There's an unhealed version of you when you betray a partner or you cheat. And that unhealed version of you so desperate to be seen is so desperate for love.

but you don't go towards the person willing to love you and give you all that open love. Instead, you go look for your worthiness, you go look for love in these unhealthy forms of cheating and different partners. You go try to fill a void instead of sitting with it and thinking, why am I looking for destructive behavior like this to lose a love like this that comes once in a lifetime, instead of sitting there to reflect on

Shazmeen Bank (07:12.19)
these wounds that we have, instead we just go out and act on them. And we choose to stay unconscious to what we do. We choose to stay unconscious to how we hurt and damage ourselves and how we hurt and destroy another person as well. So when your partner wants to play the cat and mouse game, it has to also reach a place sometimes where you're just exhausted of being in a relationship where unless I can prove to you

that I know everything about what you have done, the truth isn't going to come out. You need to be in a place where you turn around and you communicate to your partner and you say, look, I'm not willing to play this game. This is the information that has been revealed. Now, let's create a safe environment that either you can reveal everything you have to reveal and my reaction and responses are not going to be perfect. I'm hurting. I don't know how to be the safe sp-

the safe person for you in a situation that's leaving me feeling very unsafe created by you. So it becomes very difficult for you to be the person that creates safety to the person that's hurting you.

Shazmeen Bank (08:29.042)
your partner will have stopped completely communicating because if I talk more, what are the chances that you stay with me? What if we talk a little bit more and you're catching me cheating on you now? But what if you find out about all the times I was cheating on you all these years? What if all the secrets and skeletons in the closet I've managed to tuck there come out? And this is why it gets

really sticky when you start to try and catch your partner and everything as opposed to you taking a step back in the relationship and saying, look, I want to be with someone that's honest. I'm willing to be with someone that makes mistakes, but I'm willing to be with someone that makes mistakes and is honorable enough to work on them, honorable enough to speak the truth. Let me see how I feel about the truth. Give me my right.

which is my space to digest what you're saying, who you are and where we really are as a couple. Give me my right to step back and say, can I come into this relationship and meet you where we really are, not where I thought we were in the relationship. And so you have to be the person that communicates to them and says, I'm not coming here. If you shut down in the communication, then

The expectation for me to keep showing up in the relationship is not going to be possible. My standard in the relationship is honesty, is the ability to have very hard conversations, is our ability to take the breaks in those conversations, is our ability to communicate how we both have an expectation to have this hard conversation. But I'm not going to be in a relationship with someone that lies. It is just not something I'm going to do.

I'm not willing to be wounded in a relationship where a year down the line, two years down the line, five years down the line, certain behavior happens again and is going to trigger, are you cheating? Are you lying? And do I need to start looking through your phone again? So either we handle this as two grownups and adults, we professionally get help or let's take the time out to say this is not going to be a fun conversation, but

Shazmeen Bank (10:56.398)
Are you willing to be in a relationship with me if I am willing to listen to the truth and I might get angry, I might shout, I don't know how I will feel two, three days from now or three weeks from now. Maybe when you say the truth, I know one thing is I will hold you in a different regard to respect. I will respect your honorability to speak truth, to show up.

because that tells me something about your character. It tells me you can make terrible mistakes, but you have the honor inside of you to rectify it. And that shows me you love me. You want to keep me in your world. What happens in these dynamics is when someone cuts communication from you, they hurt you, they cheat on you, and then they pull away. It leaves you not in your essence and energy to sit there and say, I'm not chasing that.

I'm worthy of truth coming to me. I'm worthy of the relationship meeting me in the way I've been meeting the relationship. I'm staying here. What happens is you end up now chasing validation and your self-worth in their quietness and them pulling away. It leaves you feeling, wait a minute, you cheated on me? Am I not worthy of the truth? Do you not care? I'm going to now start chasing you and prove to you.

all the times I loved you and showed up in the relationship. Does all of that not matter? Does all the love I ever gave you not matter? So you have to be very clear with a standard you have if your partner cheats on you. It's not a standard we go into relationships thinking about because a lot of the times when you find out your partner is cheating on you, you're blindsided. You don't expect it.

If you don't meet someone, fall in love with them, shake their hands and say, can't wait for you to cheat on me. I'm prepared for this. No one's prepared for it. No one's prepared for what it's going to feel like. No one's prepared for the devastation it brings in a relationship. So don't play the cannon mouse game. You don't want to speak the truth, then I'm not willing to be in this relationship. It's going to be really hard, but I'm not showing up. I'm not showing up to someone who cheats on me and then continues to lie to me.

Shazmeen Bank (13:18.603)
No one voluntarily comes clean. No one. A lot of the times the relationship gets exposed, the cheating gets exposed. And so does the person's personality. So does their ability to handle the situation. Cheating doesn't just expose an affair. Cheating exposes someone's self-discipline. Cheating exposes someone's inner world.

how they think, how they make decisions, their weakness to...

fantasies, their weakness to pleasure and lust that's around them. Cheating and affairs expose you to your connection to religion, to God, to your childhood, to your mom, to your dad. It opens up a can of worms that nobody expects because nobody cheats thinking they're going to get caught. So the best way is I would not

chase them and hound them down. I would hold your energy and your self-respect and I would say this needs to come to me. I'm not coming to you.

Shazmeen Bank (14:39.659)
All righty. Thank you so much MN for that unbelievable question. The next question I have is what if the cheating behavior is repetitive? If they are doing the work after all the damage is done, should the partner remain loyal? Even if the attempt to resolve and forgive has already been given, the partner has been through rebuilding and given chances.

What to do when children are involved. The trauma will generate to the highest impact for those children. So let's answer the first one. What if the cheating behaviors, what if, let's address the first part. What if the cheating behavior is repetitive? Then you pretty much know a hard decision you need to make. If you stay in the relationship where someone's going to consistently cheat on you, then you know what to expect and they know

what to expect with you. They know that you enable the behavior. They know how to get around you and how to weave lies even more. If you choose to stay with someone, then you have to be prepared for the pain you're going to go through and the cycles you're going to go through. So if cheating is consistently repetitive, then at what point do you have enough? At what point do you say no more? At what point do you protect yourself? At what point do you protect your children?

from that behavior. Now, if they're doing the work after all the damage is done, should the partner remain loyal? First of all, I don't think you should ever cheat on your partner back because they've cheated on you. I don't think you should use that as an excuse to also go out of the relationship.

because I feel that's a test on your character, that's a test on your values and your self-discipline and the respect you have for yourself.

Shazmeen Bank (16:46.955)
Even if the attempt to resolve and forgive has already been given and the partner has been through rebuilding and given chances, what do do when children are involved? Now, when children are involved, if you feel that you've shown up to the relationship and you've given it all the chances you can and you have nothing left in you, then you have nothing left in you. And what's left in you is

to pull away and start to digest and think about what you need to do for yourself going forward.

When children are involved, we have to be really careful with staying for children because if we choose to stay, then we have to be real adults about making sure these children are not exposed to slamming doors, to our anger, to our screaming matches, to our silent treatment towards each other. Then are we staying together and having dinner and breakfast together? Are we staying together and Sundays are

picnics and taking the kids out together? Are we staying together and really making sure what we experience as a couple and as adults we can actually leave into a closed room and deal with really maturely or with a professional? And when we have to show up for the children, we really show up now. As humans and as adults, I don't see that as always being perfectly possible. Your children can pick up on the

slightest change in your mood. They pick up on when you're sad and you're crying and you are a human being. You are not going to be able to just feel painful emotions in a bathroom and behind closed doors when they're not available. They see everything. They notice everything. They can see when you're down and you're sad. They can notice when mom and dad are happy, when they're not talking, when there's a slight change on the dining table. They pick everything up.

Shazmeen Bank (18:51.947)
and it stays in their nervous system. So the trauma generates the highest impact to those children when as adults, we have a hard time leaving, when as adults, we keep trying with someone that's not willing to work on themselves, when someone keeps promising change and we keep giving them the chances and they don't live up to it. There's a big difference with someone saying, I want to change.

And there's a big difference with someone's ability to carry out that change consistently. And it comes down to you having to make a decision for your wellbeing and the wellbeing of those children because they're getting exposed to seeing a parent cheating. They're getting exposed to seeing that when a parent cheats, you stay. And this is how a lot of us grew up, right? We saw

our parents being abused, saw our parents being cheated on, we saw love not being exchanged, we saw doors being slammed. And what do we go look for when we're older? We go look for familiar kind of love. Because as adults, when we don't take the responsibility to fight but then repair healthily in front of our children, we're showing them that a familiar kind of love means

You have to work for it or it's inadequate or someone is not worthy of a different kind of really responsible, secure kind of love. It is not easy when you're in a situation with a partner you've given many chances to and you have real life responsibilities. You still have to go to work. You still have to show up for your children. You still have to put a smile on your face, but there's a difference when you can heal in that environment on your own.

when you can take space from that relationship for the well-being of your children and both of you can decide they don't deserve to be a part of this anymore. Our children don't deserve to be a part of the dysregulation we have between each other as adults. And maybe the right thing we can do right now is to put these children first before our own needs. We've already gone and put our own needs by having the affair and cheating multiple times.

Shazmeen Bank (21:09.227)
I think now it needs one parent to be an adult to really protect them and say, these children deserve to be talked to now, depending on the age of the children as well. That's something we should consider because some children are too young to have a conversation with and some children are the young children discovering the affairs. Some children are the young children keeping this information in. They are the people who read the messages because they're playing on your phone and they're confused and they don't know that

If I go tell mom or I go tell dad, am I responsible for breaking the family? And they're the children who expose the affair and obviously are part of the eruption. And then they're holding it inside of them saying, did I do something wrong? So depending on how old your children are, they still deserve a certain level of openness and vulnerability from your side. If they're extremely young, their mental health, their emotional health has to be taken care of.

By asking them, how do you feel? What's going on for you? Do you have anything you'd like to tell mom and dad? Are you feeling scared? Are you nervous? Sitting down to talk to them at that level, making it very safe for them to express themselves, letting them know that they are so loved by both of you, that they are seen and holding room for their pain and confusion. If you have children who are teenagers, then in this generation,

they can see clearly what's going on. So talking to them and sometimes telling your children that, don't know, I don't have all the right answers, but what matters to me right now is making sure your wellbeing is taken care of and my wellbeing is taken care of and we're trying to figure out where this goes from here. So it's open conversations at the different ages that they're at, but creating room for them to speak and them to share how they feel.

What are their fears? Asking them, this is the environment right now. What do you think would be a healthy environment for you? I'm thinking of me and dad are thinking of separating or whoever it is, if you're not married, we're thinking of separating right now to create space for healing. How does that feel for you? Does that leave you scared or does it give you some relief with this environment? So it's very complex. But I would start with also making sure your mental

Shazmeen Bank (23:34.409)
health in terms of digesting where you are emotionally. Are you done? Are you exhausted? Are you numb? Do you want to even try again? And then creating that room for your children. And sometimes separation is a really great option. It gives people the clarity that they need and the room they need to take a step back from the environment they're constantly in, digest what they're going through.

and then be able to work on it. Now, a follow through I would have to this question is I actually had somebody

Shazmeen Bank (24:16.478)
I actually had somebody write in to me and I loved his message because

Shazmeen Bank (25:07.359)
Now in relation to that, I'm going to read you a message that I got on my TikTok this week. It's by somebody called Leo. And if you're feeling hopeless and you don't know if you can overcome infidelity, it really is going to take the person that has betrayed you to equally, if not more, want to put in the effort and want to make the relationship work. It's really

going to take them to step up and prove to you they love you. This is what someone wrote to me, okay? His name is Leo and he said, oh my God, this is so true. From 2004 to 2006, I was on drugs as an addict. I was a man on coke and I was a walking post and I was a walk.

Shazmeen Bank (26:02.113)
Oh my god this is so true. From 2004 to 2006 I was on drugs as an addict. I was a man on coke. I was a walking porn star. My life was all about lying, deceiving and most of all cheating. I hurt my wife badly and I drove her till insanity. I went to rehab and therapy and I got clean. I regained her trust throughout the years and we got married in 2012.

That's six years later. The wounds were deep, they healed, but left big scars. She forgave me, but will never forget and so as I. Till this day, I am struggling with the guilt when I see or hear her pain. And if I don't see it, it's hurting me and haunting me on a daily basis on my own. We love each other very much. And we overcame this, it's hard and sometimes heartbreaking on both sides.

So please don't cheat on the person you love. It's never ever worth it. The pleasure is short and the pain is for a lifetime. The reason I'm reading this is because here is someone who and did the hard work. They went and got professional help. They went and fought their demons and it took

six years before they got married, six years for someone to commit and say, I trust you. I feel safe, but the wounds are always there. The scars will always be there. It's a matter of when something touches it and reignites it and a small trigger happens, but it's about working through it together as a couple. And I love this for him. I love that there's

what you all need, is not just hope, but proof. Proof that people who cheat and can be in such a devastatingly bad place in their lives, going through whatever they're going through, step up and they make those relationships work. So it's really different when you're in a relationship with someone on a constant loop of cheating on you and there's no commitment to change that behavior. Then there has to be a commitment to you.

Shazmeen Bank (28:28.691)
changing how you show up in that relationship and why you're choosing to still stay in that relationship. I'm not saying these are easy decisions to make. I know the real life hard places where it's not always easy for everyone to just walk away. Not everyone has the financial means to walk away. Not everyone has the support system to be able to just curl up and move back home into.

Shazmeen Bank (29:07.583)
So Leo is a beautiful example to when someone wants to put in the hard work and make it work that they can and you can end up living the life you want really realistically, which is being so present to when pain will come up. And it also gives you an insight into the person who's betrayed you. We think people who have betrayed us are heartless people. It's like the way we view avoidantly attached people.

We think dismissively avoidantly attached people or fearfully avoidantly attached people are just heartless and humane people. They're not. They just have a much more painful way to be in a relationship with them because they're not emotionally inclined. They don't live in a world where it's very safe to show that emotion and come out of how they've constructed their world to not live in that level of emotion.

And so it's the same thing when people have betrayed somebody. There are some people who don't own up to it, who pull away, who continue to cheat, who can go on to manipulate and control somebody else to keep them in a relationship with them. And it can have us judge them very harshly. But here's an example of a man who went and made it work.

Shazmeen Bank (30:32.87)
Here is an example of a man who stepped up and is human to the wounds he had. Being on drugs is a different world. There's a different level of pain that comes up for you that is drowned out by you never wanting to have to deal with certain things in your life. And so I have compassion for people who have been betrayed and I have compassion for the person that

betrays you. Even the person that closes off ghosts you and moves on like nothing happened. The compassion to them is their inability to sit in emotion and experience the beauty and the juice of life and what relationships really have to bring and give them.

Shazmeen Bank (31:30.343)
Somebody else says that I'm the other woman, his wife who suffered this. We were married for three years and he cheated for two years in this duration. He said to me he never wants wife life.

Shazmeen Bank (31:49.106)
He said to me he never wants wife life to her and said to her his wife is his family and his choice. He was cheating and cheating continuously and never wanted to let me go and her too. She knew he was married but she still did with me and my husband. She still did it with me and my husband is fully responsible for all. I gave him chances if he could become a better husband. I tolerated

I and a liar husband and never wanted him to father my children. He was fed up from me to go for an outside woman, so I left him. He's trying to approach me, but I disconnected myself from his world. I left my country, my parents, and career for him, and he did this to me.

Shazmeen Bank (32:44.274)
He did this to me. So in strong relationships, what can she expect from him? Heartbroken. This is an example of the other woman that gets cheated on and her experience and how painful it is. And what can she expect from him? I don't think she's going to ever get to experience the full level of him compared to someone like Leo who went for hap went.

compared to somebody like Leo that I read who went to rehab, went and got the help. When you cheat on someone and you move on and you're thinking what does the other person experience, well they'll never experience the full version of you. They can't experience a full version of someone that's not experiencing the full version of themselves. They will always get the broken, fragmented pieces of them. In Serge's Re...

in surges of energy that the other person has to give. When someone cheats, they are giving out little parts of themselves to be seen in love.

because they are terrified of being in a long-term relationship and being left if someone sees them for who they truly are. And so it's easier to keep cheating because when you keep cheating, you don't invest in those relationships. It's not real love. You're not opening yourself up to the greatest parts of you. And so what could she expect is right now a broken version of him because

He's not the person who's cheated, lost his family, gone and got help, married the person he was having an affair with and is happy. I mean, there are scenarios, many scenarios, where an affair is happening and the person does leave their spouse for the other person. They go on to get married and have children.

Shazmeen Bank (34:54.968)
and possibly turn around and even say they found the love of their life. But that's because they evolved to a different version of themselves when they met this other person. You are never married to the same person you met in the beginning. You're consistently married to different versions and parts of yourselves and we forget to keep integrating those parts of ourselves as we stay married. We forget to be seen.

in these different stages. And then along comes someone who sees you in that stage. When you look at someone like Jeff Bezos, who married the lady that he married, he walked away from a marriage that he was in for a long time, married the person he was having an affair with, and seems to be happy. But that's probably because a different version, a different part of himself

that he grew into didn't get recognized in the first marriage because he didn't show up in that marriage the way he should have. That marriage already had stacked pain. It had issues he probably wasn't willing to be able to solve or she wasn't willing to be able to go into. And when you have an affair, somebody comes in at the level you're in. They don't experience all

the heartache, all the pain, all the fights. They come into a version of you that you feel, is a version of me I'm at now. So there are many people that do marry the person they're having an affair with and leave a lot of people like this lady behind, suffering in pain and in confusion. But

We can't ever turn around and say they're not completely happy. We can't turn around and say that everyone that marries their mistress or the mister they were with are miserable. Some people truly are happy. I have personally coached people who...

Shazmeen Bank (37:07.321)
are the people who are trying to make sure this doesn't happen to them. The mistress is now in a session saying, I know that we completely destroyed a marriage and we're married now and we love each other and we want to make that relationship work. And as professionals, you don't judge, you work with them where they are. But then you also get to see the other side of the destruction that's left behind from the person that invested.

and loved and gave everything and didn't expect this to happen.

Shazmeen Bank (37:47.611)
Can we 100 % say that?

This is what I tell you, the fact that he didn't want to let you go was because he was getting loved by two women in a way that selfishly filled him. It didn't have him put in the hard work with one person and work hard to make that relationship work. It's easy. Anybody can go and have an affair. Anybody can be loved by multiple people and you show up as different versions of yourself in all those relationships because they're all with different people.

that have different needs and different requirements and pull different degrees of what they want with you. But when you're in a committed long-term relationship with one person, they're pulling everything out of you. They want everything out of you. They want to experience all of you. And sometimes that's stacked with all the mistakes, the pain, and the unresolved trauma in that relationship to begin with. Where do we start building and bringing out different sides of us that

Want to be appreciated and seen and loved for also where we are, not just all the mistakes we keep making in that relationship. And that's why affairs, infidelity and betrayal is complex and extremely painful. Either both people are left in pain or one person moves on and the other person's left in unbelievable amounts of pain. Eventually with the right work, you do end up healing.

but it's pain you never prepared yourself to go through and ask for.

Shazmeen Bank (39:42.585)
Another question I have is, Shaz, could you please explain why I feel no pain? Him cheating hurt the first time when I was 8 months pregnant with our baby. And I did in a work, healing, etc. I watched videos like yours that helped, anxious me, but this time around I noticed that I felt nothing. Am I used to the abuse?

or am I healing because my outlook on the situation is less emotional this time and more towards myself and how I'm supposed to deal with it within myself from now on and less about me telling him what to do. Applause because he really isn't doing what we're discussing and a part of me is in detector mode now. I'm glad he did it because now I don't feel bad about moving on. So first of all,

You could not be feeling pain because you're numb, you're exhausted, you're tired. Also, you could not be feeling pain because you are healing. You're not at a level where you're scrambling trying to get them to see your worth and cling onto you, hold onto you and fight for you. And there are times where you're already a mama, which means you're fighting not only for your self-respect and dignity, but you're standing up for that.

baby that you have, what they deserve to see love really is. And you've grown self-worth and you've grown self-respect and that's why you don't need someone to chase you down and you don't need to chase them down. You've been through this journey with them. You've gone through the silk being dragged through the thorns with them already. You're not willing to do it again because you understand

what that left you feeling, how that left you feeling. And if someone's not willing to do what they say that they want to do, then there's no amount of begging, forcing, and trying to prove to them that we'll ever get them to invest in that relationship without someone wanting to do it on their own, without someone seeing what your worth is and living up to your standards. When we raise our frequency,

Shazmeen Bank (41:58.934)
When we know what our self-worth is, when we start to become more secure and heal, then you don't have to convince someone to love you. You don't have to convince someone to show up for you. You don't have to convince someone to want you, validate you and reassure you. You're already doing that for yourself. You're starting to get more whole and more complete with what you will tolerate and not tolerate.

And so this is a beautiful testament to you that you're willing to move on now, meaning I'm willing to be single if it means I'm going to be happier. I'm not going to be in a relationship with someone that keeps cheating on me, promising me and having me hold on to hope. Not when I have a child, not when I'm in a different phase of my life. So it's a huge testament to you growing. It's a huge testament.

to anybody out there saying that no more. I am not willing to beg someone to love me anymore. And that means that you're really doing the work. That means that you know you're deserving of healthier relationships and people that are willing to communicate and repair and handle conflict and honestly not go about giving into lust and just cheating and going through whatever they need to go through. And sometimes people do cheat because

they're so wounded that they want to be loved and seen. And you know what? It's not fair to go through that while you have someone willing to love you and cherish you and fill you with all the love that you are looking for, but you don't feel deserving of living, of receiving that kind of love from the person you're with. That's why cheating, you go and receive the love from somebody that you don't have to work

truly hard to get that love from. And there is a self-worth issue because sometimes you have the most perfect person loving you. They tick all the boxes and you end up thinking you cheated on me with them. You cheated on me. I mean, not in a rude way, but look at me and not in a rude way, but I know I'm above a standard.

Shazmeen Bank (44:21.609)
where everyone's always turned around to say, you're lucky you have me. So how do you cheat on me and make me question who I am? It's because they know they have you. You're above the standard. You're someone that they never felt worthy of having to begin with. So they sabotaged the relationship, never knowing when someone like you could leave them for someone more like you. Not realizing that it was never about how they look.

It was about you loving the person you saw inside, loving the heart that you fell in love with inside of them. So well done. You are completely on a remarkable journey of healing these different wounds inside of you. I'm so proud of you.

Shazmeen Bank (45:22.496)
Someone else says you're 100 % correct, my partner did that. They blamed me for the cheating for most of our relationship. He was cheating with the same person. So now I stayed and he's never taken any accountability for his actions. He wants me to get over it and when I bring it up he gaslights me and makes it about me. I don't know how to get over it, he just tells me every day he loves me but he's just saying what I want to hear. Thank you. So...

You know, this is the complexity of sometimes with some people it's so simple, which is he keeps cheating on you with the same person, but you are still in that relationship because there's a part of you where you've not discovered your self-worth. You've not discovered this is not the person you need to be with that fills that void for you and that wound for you that you're staying because they represent

a part of your childhood that is so familiar, which is in your childhood, you couldn't leave mom or dad when they treated you badly. You didn't have the financial means or the ability to just walk out. And so right now, there's a part of you that's still an inner child playing to the same role. You haven't recognized you're an adult. You are grown. You have

all these experiences that completely make you whole, that make you fulfilled. You are an adult that doesn't need to be an inner child that stays in a relationship with someone representing one of your parents. And the situation you're in allows you to step away and say, I can choose me, I can leave. It might not be easy. I might not financially have

the ability and the means to do it right now, but I can start working on my self-esteem and my self-esteem means staying with someone that keeps cheating on me and then says they love me. Is that the kind of love I want? What does love mean to me? We have to start taking responsibility for the fact we stay in relationships and we don't know what we want. We don't believe we have a right to our needs being met. We don't even know what love really looks like.

Shazmeen Bank (47:48.475)
we've never taken the time to love ourselves and love our inner child and make them whole and integrate with them. And so he says he loves you and you know that that's not what you want. So I challenge you by saying what do you want? What are you worthy of? What are you capable of achieving on your own? What kind of

love or separation a time on your own do you need to give yourself? What parts of your anxious attachment do you need to heal because there's a part of you that feels you can't abandon him. So you've completely self-abandoned your own self to be in a relationship with someone just so they can say they love you and you don't feel it. And maybe you attracted this person so they could keep knocking on this wound

so that you can look deep inside of yourself and say no more. I deserve to be with someone that is willing to do the hard work to be with me too. I'm willing to be with someone who wants to fulfill my needs, who wants to sit across me and say, what do you need? How do I meet it? I want to be with someone that pushes me, encourages me, pulls out the best in me, not drains my energy to stay in this relationship with

Is this what you feel you're worth?

Shazmeen Bank (49:17.62)
That's a big question we need to start answering. Why are we staying in relationships that we know we have outgrown? They ended a long time ago. They're not even relationships. They're situationships calling for a greater part of you to heal and to move on from. And so sometimes it's not about trying to fix the relationship that you're currently in with another person. It's about fixing the relationship you're in with yourself.

You have to have the dignity and respect for yourself and hold yourself to higher standard. And until you do that, no one else is going to do it for you. They're just going to keep finding different ways to be around the person that tolerates them because you're enabling their behavior and they know that you are. You're not calling to them to step up. You're not stepping up for yourself, having them going,

my God, I actually love you and in order to be with you, I need to work on myself. They're going, in order to be with you, I can cheat on you and just tell you I love you and do a couple of the really easy things. And then I test it and see you never ever leave. So I don't really have to rise up to anything. So we need to start having highest standard for ourselves and we need to start understanding the relationships that sometimes we're currently in.

They are just an absolute mirror and a window into you having to do the hard work for yourself. The hard work of looking within. And it's scary because you don't want to be alone, but you're already alone inside. Your inner child is screaming to be seen, held and loved and parented by you. And so sometimes do we keep holding the other person accountable or do we need to be accountable?

for how we show up in relationships and what we keep attracting.

Shazmeen Bank (51:27.623)
What if a certain husband is coming from a traumatic childhood that he had no one around when he was growing up, he sees a mother figure when he's young and thinks she's taking care of me and marrying thinking it's love. mother wound. Then to later realize it's not actually love but he's stuck realizing it later but cannot move on due to the children or the responsibilities at hand. Do you think it's unfair? What's your take on this? So first of all,

my beautiful sugar crush that asked this question. When your husband comes from a traumatic childhood and he's attracted a mother figure in you, first of all, that means you have so much love to give. You have so much compassion and you have so much empathy inside of you. But you've shown up for a long time in his life as a parent. You've shown up as a mom. You've shown up maternally. And so

we've lost the attraction in the relationship as husband and wife. We've depolarized the masculine and the feminine energy in that relationship. And so he has probably taken his fill on receiving that maternal love, but as he's growing and as he's evolving, he's looking for a different dynamic in the relationship. I like that

He's responsible by not just walking out on you and knowing that he has responsibilities to the children. But we don't want to end up in relationships because we have a duty to each other. We want to be in relationships because we fulfill each other in the different phases and timelines we go through. We're not the same people we were when we met each other, when we dated, when we got married, when we had children, when we went through financial trauma, when we...

lost a parent when we grieving our jobs, we keep evolving. What we forget is we have one marriage the time we got married. We forget that we're actually having or we should be having multiple marriages to the different parts of ourselves that keep showing up in relationships. I would turn around and tell you to sit him down and say, what are you looking for? Is they a part of you that maybe sexually were not aligned?

Shazmeen Bank (53:50.81)
Is there a part of you that maybe sexually you're looking for, that you're craving, that materially isn't working for this relationship? We're sort of hitting a roommate, stalemate part of our relationship. What parts of you are ignited inside of you that you would love to see in our relationship? These are the hard, healthy conversations we need to be having because we cannot be fulfilled unless we are brave enough.

and vulnerable enough to lead in our relationships. So is it unfair? Well, that's a hard question to answer because he attracted a part of you that was a caregiver, a rescuer, a fixer and a saver. You only got attracted to him as well because it was a part of you that felt worthy by being needed in the way that you were needed, correct? Now,

We're in a beautiful phase of our relationship where maybe both of you don't need to play certain roles anymore. What are the fun roles you can start to have in your relationship together? What are the new conversations you can start having with him? You can be brave enough to lead. What is some the spiciness you can bring into that relationship that I'm only assuming if you're playing a mother role won't be in that relationship. They could be a big gap.

And this is sometimes the part of a relationship people use as an excuse to go cheat. not saying that, instead of them going to cheat on you, there's no role you would play for anyone doing that. But maybe there's a spicy fun side in this relationship both of you can reignite and you could bring the fun to the relationship. Maybe you could start telling him,

I'd love to go on date nights and I'd love to learn you and I'd love for you to learn me again. What are some of the dating games we could play? What are some of the essential ways you'd love me to show up and what are some of the essential ways I want you to show up? You've probably played, you know, a role where I got to caretake you as a child and I don't want to be married to a child. I want to be married to an equal partner as well. So I might have played

Shazmeen Bank (56:12.291)
a maternal role for you, but then you've played a different role for me that I'm not enjoying either. How can I feel needed in this relationship? And we can go into a new phase of our relationships. And this is the thing that we think that all relationships have to come to an end when certain parts of ourselves are coming to an end. Well, different parts of ourselves come to an end as we keep evolving and growing. So we keep

having to have harder, newer, more exciting conversations in our relationships. And I think that's the fun of what keeps long-term relationships with the spark alive, is going with the flow at the different phases both of you are at. And it doesn't mean the relationship ever has to end. It means one of us has to get brave enough to lead. And I think that that's you. I think you can lead the relationship and

maybe start to get professional help and he can speak to someone about the trauma he's been through or you could get curious about what did you go through, what does it mean, what was your childhood like and maybe create room for him to start sharing his pain. And remember when people start to share their pain and their yearnings then they want to be a part of your world too. They want to

create room for you when they feel room's been created for them as well. So this is a beautiful place for anyone in their relationships to take their relationship to a completely different level.

Shazmeen Bank (57:57.202)
So one of the questions someone asked is, you asked if anyone had a question and I was with my ex since we were 16 years old, 40 years, a very big life and close family.

Shazmeen Bank (58:27.471)
Okay, question. You asked, here's another question for someone. I was with my ex since we were 16 years old. 40 years of very big life, close family. So I'm assuming they were together for a long time. The last time he cheated in 2020, I had proof. Several infidelities over the years. So he ran. Naturally, couldnt face what he's done to you.

He's an avoidant. Okay, makes even more sense. And narcissistic. Right.

I can't understand how these men flip, how he promised me he would reassure people that they would turn on me and that his goal and this was his goal. I did nothing but unconditionally love him and give loyalty. He married the mistress, moved to her state, raises her young children and has no ties to ours. It's crazy. He never told us he was moving, interstate or getting married.

He just does these things. I can't wrap my head around it still or trust another. First of all, of course, this is not easy to go through and you know, there's a lot of times where people that are dismissively avoidantly attached or extremely fearfully avoidantly attached, they get very confused for being narcissistic. I don't know if he really is someone that is narcissistic, but it would

completely makes sense with him threatening to ruin your image because you have proof and you can show he's several infidelities because anyone that's narcissistic doesn't want their image spoiled. They have a grandiose charming image the rest of the world versus how they show up at home and he's already lost face with his children and he's lost face with you.

Shazmeen Bank (01:00:49.909)
and he's not going to lose face outside and so he will threaten you and say, if you expose me, I'll probably expose you in other ways too that are not true. But it's his way of unskillfully saying, I'm kind of begging you and I don't beg people to not spoil my name. And the fact that he would marry his mistress and move states and raise her children is almost like he gets this fresh start, right? He has children that look up to him.

He gets to play a role to them. He is with the mistress, which means if he's taking care of her children and if he is extremely narcissistic, then he will make sure that he probably loves those children in a way that have her completely dependent on him then. Because that's what they do. They find different ways that if the mistress at some point even ever wanted to leave, she can't because now the children love him.

Now she's fully dependent on him. And I just feel in a way, him moving away from you gives you that space. It has you process what you've been through slowly, one day at a time. And I'm glad that you have your adult children. And I hope that all of you, your adult children and you come together to talk, to speak, to be there for each other.

And you know, it's really hard when someone cheats and then they get exposed because they don't want to face a version of themselves. Some people cheat, get exposed and want to rectify that version of themselves. They don't want to lose their families and they go through the ends of the world like Leo earlier on that I read to make their relationships work.

Even with the patience of the six years, probably took him to get to marry the woman that he hurt so much. And he can admit that he pushed her to insanity. But there's some people who won't go there. They'll cheat and they don't want to be exposed and they don't have the energy to make the relationship work. They want everything to be better. They want you to forgive them. They want you to just

Shazmeen Bank (01:03:15.165)
join them where they are. Let's not make a big deal. Let's not discuss this. Let's not go deep with this. And so when you are not willing to do that, that's hard work that clearly they're not willing to go into. So it's easier to marry the mistress because she's already infatuated with him. She's infatuated with the version of him that shows up. She's infatuated with the version of him that is now loving her children.

and is making her life easier financially or in a multitude of ways where because she's unhealed she feels having a man in that way fulfills a void and a fear that no one would ever love her and see her. We're so complex as human beings and the reason we do the things we do all stem from our pain and our wounds and our fears and when we start to heal then we don't have behavior like that, we don't tolerate behavior like that, we don't

put ourselves in a line to attract people to that kind of a degree. And I cannot imagine the pain you're in, but I'm so proud of the fact that you are courageous enough to

Shazmeen Bank (01:04:28.321)
Find proof and let him go, not beg him to stay. I've worked with people who feel they've lost so much dignity in begging someone in ways you could not believe to choose them over a mistress. And it's never allowed the relationship to be the same because the relationship that person has with themselves after begging someone to stay with them and choose them has never been the same. It takes a lot of

respect to choose ourselves, which means we stand in the line of fear to say, I'm going to end up alone. I'm probably 40. I'm probably 50 years old, but you know what? I'm not willing to be with someone that is not willing to be with me and show up and do the hard work to reignite a relationship and be a part of a long-term relationship. So.

Shazmeen Bank (01:05:26.669)
You did nothing but unconditionally love him and I would walk away feeling so proud about who you are, proud about how your children see you and proud about the fact that you loved and you gave your time and you don't want to take that back because you showed up honorable the right way and in the best way you could have in that relationship. So

I'm really proud of you and to anybody that's hurting over their partner marrying the mistress and leaving and going to raise another family. Sometimes I say to people like that when I work with them in a session is what part of you healed that pushed them out? What part of you healed that actually had your partner leave you? What part of you healed?

that didn't want to be in this relationship anymore. so subconsciously, you created room just for yourself now to want better. And a lot of people will sit there going, I never thought of it that way. I never realized that I'm part of creating that space off my partner leaving me was because I was no longer willing to be in a relationship with them at that level anymore. And so

I wasn't willing to walk away because I was too scared, but I was still part of the energy of pushing them away so that now I could just sit and deal with what I need to deal with, which is why did I stay? What parts of me attracted this relationship when I did? What parts of me are healing that no longer want to be in a relationship with this kind of a person? What parts of me can forgive them if I'm ready to because they are still so wounded?

and they're going to show up in that relationship wounded too. So what parts of me can let them go because I'm healing the wounded parts of me as well. Focus on your children and give them everything because as you pour into your kids, they pour back into you and all of you have got this.

Shazmeen Bank (01:08:03.675)
do I stop feeling the need to be desired or seen or wanted? Well, we never stop that feeling. Why should we? It's a human need. It's a human need to be seen, to be desired, to be wanted, to be cherished, to be chased, to be someone that somebody puts in the effort and the energy to want to be with you, to learn you, to invest in you, to push you, to encourage you. I would tell you, never stop

feeling. How do you, how do I stop feeling the need to be desired or seen or wanted? Don't. But see you, desire you, feel you, want you, because when you realize you're so worthy of all of that, you end up attracting somebody in your life that matches that energy, that wants to love you and desire you and see you, that wants to grow with you, that wants to invest with you.

because you come in with a certain standard, so you attract someone with a certain standard. But when you say, how do I stop feeling all of these? It's already lowering the energy. It's already saying that, are you not worthy of all of that? Who in your life made you feel that? And so if you lower all of that, you're coming down, you're playing at this playing field, you're going to attract people that live here. You're going to attract people that...

Don't put in an effort, don't want to desire you, don't want to be seen, but want from you. So anyone, my God, you should desire yourself and see yourself and want yourself in the most beautiful ways because why not? And I'm going to tell you, if you're a man, take your wife's bright red lipstick and write on the mirror, I'm enough. I have a right to be desired and seen and I see and desire myself. And if you're a woman,

do the same for yourself because there's nothing more freeing and powerful to step into feminine energy and feminine energy because this is a question from a woman wants to be seen, wants to be giving, wants to be loved, wants to be nurtured as much as feminine energy wants to nurture back. So I would start to work with the parts of you that should be seen. I would

Shazmeen Bank (01:10:25.747)
go do your hair, I would get into the gym, I would lose weight, I would let go of the parts of me that are covering me up. And I would start to see myself in the beautiful, sexy, amazing version of myself that I should see physically. And then I would start to see myself inside as the pure, beautiful, humble, incredible, God-fearing, virtuous person inside of me for all these traits.

that I carry that I want someone to see. Be seen externally and know your traits and characteristics inside so you can also invite someone into your world that's curious about wanting to learn about you as a person inside as much as they appreciate the beautiful deliciousness of you outside.

Shazmeen Bank (01:11:54.281)
So here's a question for the Q &A episode. Avoidant when they go to someone else directly after a breakup. Do they love them or love me or love us both? Which one is the real deep love? Who touched his soul? That has been a big exclamation mark to me. So first of all, I see you. I see that you're looking to be seen. I see you're looking to be validated.

I see you're looking for your deep love, your personality, all of you to be embraced, to be wanted, seen, desired, valued, appreciated. when someone... I would not ask who touched his soul. I would...

not want to compete with somebody that can walk away from me and go be with somebody else. I would raise my frequency and self-worth to a level where I know, I know who I am.

I know what I bring to a relationship. I know who I can be in a relationship. And maybe my frequency is so high that it doesn't attune to yours anymore. It has you going to look for someone that's okay to be cheated on with me. That's okay to be part of the cheating and the affair.

We have to start asking better questions and recognizing that we shouldn't attach our self-worth to the people that pull away and walk away from us. We have to attach our self-worth to the fact that we let them. You walked away from me, but I let you. I didn't chase you. I didn't need to. In fact, my subconscious energy probably pushed you out the door because I'm creating so much room to love myself and step up for myself.

Shazmeen Bank (01:13:57.16)
When avoidance go to someone directly after a breakup, it's because they're not processing the breakup with you. They cannot. They don't know emotionally how to go there. They don't want to feel that pain. They're going to numb it out by getting into a hobby, getting into another relationship, getting themselves seen, getting attention, getting someone else to love them because they're feeling unworthy from the breakup with you. So they don't want to deal with their unworthy wound.

So they go and find someone else that makes them feel seen and loved and cherished. And they'll do it in whatever ways they can.

Shazmeen Bank (01:14:42.33)
If you're looking to feel better, I would turn around and not feel better by trying to compare myself or trying to ask or find my validation in if they loved me. I know it's hard. You know, which one's the real deep love who touched his soul? You have to touch, you probably touched his soul. You probably touched his soul in a multitude of ways.

but he probably couldn't show up and love you in the ways you deserved anymore. And there's a reason you broke up and I would focus on why you've broken up and how you've grown and what you need, what you needed in that relationship as well that you did not get. What parts of yourself did you lose? What parts of yourself did you abandon to be in that relationship? What parts of yourself will you never abandon to be in a relationship again? I would not.

as hard as it is, as human as it is to fixate yourself on someone else showing up and loving you, I would focus on loving yourself even more.

Shazmeen Bank (01:16:23.783)
I have loved answering all of your questions and as you can beautifully see the amazing light again on my spotlight.

I have loved answering all of your questions. have so many more to be able to get through. We will answer more of them on next Thursday's Q &A. But whatever you're going through in your relationships, I want you to realize that sometimes it takes you to be brave to lead the relationship out of the rut it's in. And sometimes it takes bravery to lead yourself out of a relationship that is not going to enhance your life or theirs or is going nowhere.

some

Shazmeen Bank (01:17:22.862)
I've loved answering all of your questions and remember you are worth

I have loved answering all of your questions and we'll answer so many more every single Thursday, so keep them coming. it takes a lot of bravery to lead a relationship to where it can grow and...

It takes a lot of leadership to be brave in relationships and vulnerable and make relationships work. And it takes a lot when two people are willing to put in that work. We have to be able to distinguish from the relationships that are one sided, that take office. And sometimes when we choose ourselves and we step up, we can convert people who took us for granted.

to now step up in the relationship because they don't want to lose our love and they don't want to lose us. Alternatively, we inspire people to pull away because our love and our standards have grown and their capacity to give us that kind of love cannot be matched. Whatever phase you're in in your relationship, be brave, be honorable, be vulnerable, but be true to yourself in a way where

You can love yourself fully and you can love your partner fully because they deserve the best versions of you. while predominantly we answered a lot of the infidelity questions because they stemmed from Monday's episode, I want to remind you that many couples can make it work after infidelity. It's not easy. It takes a lot of hard work.

Shazmeen Bank (01:19:15.481)
but you both deserve to be in a relationship where you choose each other and you make each other's worlds better and you show up and you push each other and you want each other to grow and you want the other person to have the best in everything. So my encouragement to you is if you're in a relationship and it needs a two degree shift,

Be the two degree shift in being brave enough to say, before I pull away, I'm going to give it everything, all of me, and not demand and not criticize and not blame. I'm going to show up in the best way. And maybe yours is the two degree shift that pulls them out of their shell and changes the whole relationship. But you want to always be with a partner that's willing to equally invest in you as well. That's key. One,

Person cannot make a relationship that requires two people to work. One person can heal themselves enough to open a door of conversation in a relationship for two people to be able to decide, can I raise to your standard as well? If not, where do we go from here? It's a lot of bravery for the relationships we're in. I believe in you. I believe in you making the relationships you're in work.

I in making the healthy relationships work and I believe in the people that need to walk away from the people who don't choose them. I believe in your bravery as well. I'll see you on Monday's episode. Thank you so much for joining in and don't forget you can find me on TikTok at shazmeen Bank, you can find me on Instagram at shazmeen Bank, you can find me on

the Love Better podcast. don't forget, you can watch all the episodes on YouTube, on Spotify, and you can listen on Amazon Music. You can listen on Apple. You can listen on iHeartRadio. Write in the topics you want me to talk about. And I got you.