Online throughout Massachusetts
Individual Therapy for the Unfaithful Spouse in Massachusetts
YOU NEVER THOUGHT YOU’D BE SOMEONE WHO HAD AN AFFAIR
You know how much damage the infidelity caused. You don’t need a therapist, or anyone else, to tell you that.
But knowing the damage hasn’t made it any easier to figure out what to do with the guilt, the confusion, or the suffocating weight of trying to hold everything together while your life feels like it’s unraveling from the inside out.
You might not even be able to explain how you ended up in an affair.
Your spouse keeps asking, and the honest answer is that you don’t know. You didn’t wake up one morning and decide to have an affair. It happened through a series of smaller moments that didn’t feel dangerous at the time: a conversation that went deeper than it should have, a connection that built so gradually you didn’t see it for what it was until you were already in the middle of it. Each rationalization felt reasonable in the moment. At some point, you crossed a line you genuinely believed you would never cross.
Now you’re trying to explain something you never consciously chose, to a spouse who understandably needs you to explain it. The guilt and shame make it almost impossible to access a clear answer, which makes the conversations at home worse.
Your closest friend, the one you’d normally call when you cheat on your spouse, would never look at you the same again. The friends you have through your spouse are off-limits for obvious reasons. So you’ve been holding the affair entirely on your own, while the only other person who knows is the person you hurt.
The shame shows up at the worst possible moments. You’re sitting in a meeting at the firm, or in clinic, or at the kitchen table helping with homework, and a wave of it hits you so hard you have to physically leave the room. You haven’t been sleeping. You’re snapping at your kids over things that don’t matter. You’re drinking more than you used to and you know it.
You cannot figure this out alone. You can’t figure it out with your spouse, because they’re the wrong person to help you understand why you betrayed them. You can’t figure it out with the people in your life.
You need a therapist who has sat across from dozens of people who cheated on their spouse, knows exactly what they’re looking at, and isn’t going to flinch when you say it out loud.
WHY UNDERSTANDING THE INFIDELITY COMES BEFORE EVERYTHING ELSE
Individual therapy for the unfaithful partner is not couples therapy, and it’s not the kind of general individual therapy where you process whatever is on your mind that week.
The premise of this work is that you had an affair for reasons you don’t fully understand yet, and that until you understand them, you can’t give your spouse the honest account they’re asking for, and you can’t do the internal work required to prevent it from happening again.
Sessions are aimed at three things: understanding why the affair happened, understanding what it means about you and your marriage, and figuring out who you want to be from here.
The way I work is shaped by Gottman couples therapy and by my training as a certified discernment counselor through the Doherty Relationship Institute. The short version of what that means for you: I don’t treat clients who cheated as sex addicts, I don’t treat them as narcissistic, and I don’t treat the affair as a one-off mistake to apologize for and move past.
I treat it as a symptom of how the marriage went wrong in a way that you participated in, that we can name, that we can understand, and that you can do something about.
How individual therapy for infidelity can help.
You can answer your spouse’s questions honestly.
Not “I don’t know,” and not a rehearsed apology, but a real, honest account of the chain of events, the vulnerabilities you weren’t paying attention to, and the specific choices you made along the way.
You can trace the path from the first boundary crossing to the last, and you understand what was happening inside you at each step.
Your spouse may not like everything they hear, but for the first time, they’re getting the truth instead of a blank stare or a defensive wall.
This kind of honest narrative is one of the most important things your spouse needs in order to heal.
01
You’ll stop shame-spiraling.
You still feel the effects of what you did, and that’s appropriate. But the guilt becomes something you can carry and learn from rather than something that flattens you at 2am and leaves you useless the next day.
You stop replaying the worst version of yourself on a loop.
You sleep through the night more often than not. You wake up and you can function, be present with your kids at breakfast, focus on your work for more than twenty minutes at a time, instead of dragging yourself through the day on three hours of broken sleep and a pit in your stomach.
02
You stop going through the motions of your own life.
You’ve been physically present but emotionally somewhere else for longer than you’d like to admit, and that started well before the affair.
Your kids talk to you at dinner and you realize you heard the words but missed the whole point. You get through a whole Saturday and can’t remember what you did.
After this work, you start catching those moments. You notice when you’ve checked out, and you come back. Not perfectly, and not every time, but enough that you’re living your life again instead of just getting through it.
03
You’ll recognize the early warning signs that used to be invisible to you.
A coworker starts confiding in you about their marriage, and instead of leaning into the conversation, you notice what’s happening and pull back.
You hear yourself thinking “it’s not a big deal” or “we’re just talking” and you recognize those thoughts for what they are, because you’ve learned exactly how the small rationalizations work, how each one makes the next one easier, and where that road ends.
The affair didn’t start with a big decision. It started with a series of small ones that you didn’t see clearly at the time. Now you see them.
04
You say the hard thing instead of brushing it under the rug.
Something is bothering you. Maybe you feel unappreciated, maybe a decision your spouse made landed wrong, maybe you’re lonely in your own home and you don’t know how to say that out loud.
Before, you would have smiled, said “it’s fine,” and added it to the quiet pile of things you never brought up. That pile is what made you vulnerable in the first place, and you know that now.
So, you say the uncomfortable thing. It’s awkward and imperfect, but you say it, because you know exactly what it costs when you don’t.
05
You trust yourself again, and this time it’s based on something real.
The first time you promised the infidelity would never happen again, you meant it, but you were making that promise without understanding how you got here in the first place. Now you do.
You know what your own rationalizations sound like. You know how boundary erosion works, how one small concession leads to the next until you've crossed a line you never saw coming. You know what happens when you swallow your frustration with your partner instead of saying it out loud. And you’ve built the skills to do it differently.
That’s a kind of confidence a promise can’t give you, and whether you stay in this marriage or not, you carry it forward to the next relationship.
06
This is a good fit for you if you…
Had an affair and carry real guilt and remorse about it. You see the damage it caused, and you want to understand why it happened so that it never happens again.
Need a space to process this that isn’t your marriage, your friendships, or your couples therapy sessions.
Are willing to look at your own behaviors and choices honestly, including the parts that are uncomfortable and unflattering.
Want a therapist who won’t label you or pathologize you.
Are open to doing the work regardless of what happens with your marriage, whether you’re staying, leaving, or don’t know yet.
This is not a good fit for you if you…
Don’t feel genuine remorse about the affair and are primarily looking for a therapist to validate that it was justified.
Want a therapist who will take your side against your spouse.
Are looking for couples therapy. If you and your spouse want to work on the marriage together, I would be happy to provide referrals to trusted colleagues who provide couples therapy.
Getting Started in Therapy & What to Expect
Format
Individual therapy sessions conducted online via secure, HIPAA-compliant telehealth. You can choose 60-minute weekly sessions or 90-minute biweekly sessions.
Investment
My fee is $500 for 60-minute sessions or $750 for 90-minute sessions. I am not in-network with any insurance company and cannot bill insurance directly.
I can provide a Superbill (an itemized receipt with a mental health diagnosis) for you to submit to your insurance company for potential out-of-network reimbursement. Not all plans reimburse for out-of-network providers, so I recommend checking with your insurance before your first session.
Getting started
Reach out through the contact page or self-schedule your first session. I’ve done my best to include everything you need to make an informed decision on this page. If you have a question that isn’t answered here, email me and I’ll get back to you within 48 to 72 hours, but usually much faster.
Availability
I typically work on Sunday and Monday mornings. I keep my caseload intentionally small. I work with just 2-3 individual clients at a time for this particular service, which means availability is limited, but it also means you get a therapist who is fully engaged. Please check my HIPAA-compliant calendar here for current openings.
Massachusetts Infidelity Therapist
I’M ALLYSON.
Gottman-trained therapist with specialized training in infidelity
I trained as a couples therapist through the Gottman Institute and completed their specialized training on treating affairs. I've spent years sitting with both partners in the aftermath of infidelity, which means I understand what your spouse is going through, what the repair process requires, and what individual work needs to happen for any of it to hold.
I built this part of my practice because I kept seeing the same gap: the partner who had the affair needed their own space to do real, honest work, and there weren't many therapists equipped to provide it.
Not someone who would over-validate you because they're only hearing your side of the story, and not someone who would jump to a description of you that doesn't fit because they don't understand how ordinary people end up here.
Someone who gets it, who will be honest with you even when it's uncomfortable, and who knows how to help you heal and move forward.
AREAS SERVED IN MASSACHUSETTS
I’m licensed in Massachusetts as an LICSW (license #126480) and work with clients via secure, HIPAA-compliant Zoom across the state.
This includes:
Greater Boston, Cambridge, Somerville, Brookline, and Newton
MetroWest communities like Wellesley, Natick, Framingham, Needham, and Concord
The North Shore including Salem, Beverly, and Gloucester
The South Shore including Quincy, Braintree, Hingham, and Plymouth
Western Massachusetts including Springfield, Northampton, and Amherst; the Worcester area
Cape Cod and the Islands
If you’re anywhere in Massachusetts, I can work with you.
FAQs
QUESTIONS ABOUT THERAPY FOR THE UNFAITHFUL SPOUSE
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My understanding of how and why affairs happen is grounded in the Gottman Institute’s 50 years of research on relationships and infidelity. I completed the Gottman Institute’s specialized training on treating affairs, which provides a research-based framework for understanding the chain of events that leads to infidelity and what genuine recovery requires.
I also use Accelerated Resolution Therapy (ART) at specific points in the process, particularly for processing guilt and shame. ART is an evidence-based therapy that helps your brain reprocess painful experiences in a way that talk therapy alone often can’t. ART is uniquely equipped to help reduce the shame to a level where you can think clearly, engage honestly, and do the repair work that matters.
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Yes, and many of my clients do. This individual work is designed to complement couples therapy, not replace it.
The couples room is for working on the relationship together. This room is for working on the parts that are yours alone: the guilt, the shame, the avoidance behaviors that led here, and the individual changes you need to make.
Most clients find that they show up to couples therapy differently once they’ve started doing this individual work, because they have more clarity, more self-awareness, and less of the knee-jerk defensiveness that makes hard conversations even harder.
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Yes. Whether or not your spouse is willing to work on the marriage, you still need a place to process what happened, understand your own behaviors, and figure out who you want to be going forward.
If your spouse isn’t open to couples work, this individual therapy becomes even more important. You’re likely going to need to make some major decisions about your future, and you’ll make much better ones when you’re not drowning in unprocessed guilt and shame.
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Yes, and this is something we can work through carefully together. Disclosure is a deeply personal and consequential decision, and there is no one-size-fits-all answer.
I can help you think through what disclosure would look like, how to prepare for the range of possible outcomes, and what you’d need to have in place before having that conversation if you decide to. What I won’t do is tell you what to do. That decision is yours.
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Yes. If you’re in the middle of an ongoing affair and feeling guilt about it, that guilt is telling you something important, and this is a place where you can figure out what to do about it.
The work here requires a willingness to look honestly at what you’re doing and why. I’m not going to pressure you into a decision before you’re ready, but I’m also not going to help you feel better about continuing something that’s causing damage to your spouse, your family, and yourself.
If you’re ready to examine what’s happening honestly, even if you don’t yet know what you want to do about it, you’re welcome here.
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I do work with betrayed partners, but through a separate arm of my practice with its own website. I keep those services intentionally separate so that each client knows the space they’re in is fully dedicated to their experience.
You can read more about my work with betrayed partners here.
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My fee is $500 for 60-minute sessions and $750 for 90-minute sessions.
I am not in-network with any insurance company and cannot bill insurance directly. I can provide a Superbill (an itemized receipt with a mental health diagnosis) for you to submit to your insurance company for potential out-of-network reimbursement. Not all plans reimburse for out-of-network providers, so I recommend checking with your insurance before your first session.
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You may self-schedule on my HIPAA-compliant calendar here.
Alternatively, please reach out through the contact page if you have questions first. I typically respond within 48 to 72 hours, but usually much faster.
