Finding out your spouse had an affair is one of the most devastating things a person can go through. After almost 20 years in family law, here's the hard truth I have to sit down and tell those clients: the affair itself probably won't change your divorce. But how you react to it can change everything.
In this episode of No One Dies from Divorce, I'm joined by CoilLaw attorney Savannah Lawrence to talk about affairs, betrayal, and what actually happens when infidelity meets family court. This one is close to my heart, because the gap between the emotional damage of betrayal and what the law will actually do about it is one of the hardest things we have to explain to a client.
Here's what most people don't realize. Utah is a no-fault state, which means the divorce is almost always granted on irreconcilable differences no matter who did what. Infidelity can matter in a very narrow set of circumstances, and I actually argued a case on exactly this in front of the Utah Supreme Court, but the scope is tiny and it only touches alimony. For the vast majority of people, the painful reality is that cheating will not hand you the win you're looking for. There is no justice or revenge waiting for you in divorce court, and chasing it usually costs you more than it ever gives back.
Savannah and I get into when an affair genuinely does affect a case, like when the cheating spouse spent marital money on the affair or when it directly impacts the kids, and why even those are harder to prove than people expect. We talk about the myth that your ex is hiding piles of money somewhere, and why that rabbit hole almost always costs far more than it recovers.
Then we get to the part that matters most: how betrayal makes people quietly sabotage their own case. The furious text message. The social media post. Following your ex to prove the affair, which crosses into stalking and harassment faster than people think. The blow-up that becomes a domestic violence charge or a protective order. Betrayal rarely destroys your case. Your reaction to it can. We share real, practical advice for staying out of that trap, including how to keep your communication clean, why revenge is a word I stop my clients from ever using, and how to keep your kids completely out of the middle of it.
If you're living through this right now, please hear the most important thing we say. Let yourself grieve, lean on your people, and get a good therapist. But keep your emotional healing separate from your legal strategy, because they don't move at the same speed, and the calmer you stay, the stronger you come out the other side.
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