The Affair Recovery Room

By AffairHealing.com

Honest conversations about affair recovery, with practical guidance and real hope. The Affair Recovery Room is a podcast for anyone reeling from infidelity: the betrayed, the unfaithful, a

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4.6

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FAQs about The Affair Recovery Room:

How many episodes does The Affair Recovery Room have?

The podcast currently has 115 episodes available.

Best of The Affair Recovery Room

The most played episodes among Podcast App listeners.

Number 1: The Betrayer’s Pain
Most people who follow this podcast are betrayed partners, and understandably so. The pain of being cheated on is acute, disorienting, and often traumatic. The Recovery Room is committed to honoring that experience.But genuine recovery, the kind that produces lasting change and real safety in a relationship, requires more than behavior management from the person who had the affair. It requires something harder with more work “on the inside.” And in this episode, we go there.Dr. Monique Thompson, a psychotherapist in the Dallas Metroplex with more than a thousand couples in her clinical background, joins Tim to talk about the side of infidelity that rarely gets examined: the inner wounds of the involved partner.This isn't about generating sympathy for someone who broke trust. It's about understanding what actually needs to happen for change to be real.In this conversation, Tim and Monique explore:Why the person who had the affair experiences a genuine fracture of identity, and why that matters for recoveryThe problem with treating behavior change as the finish lineHow shame keeps the involved partner stuck and why it actually increases the risk of repeated harmThe concept of "seemingly unimportant decisions" and how people drift toward betrayal through a long chain of uncaptured thoughtsWhy self-compassion isn't self-excuse; it's the gateway to authentic inner changeA breathing & thought practice that helps regulate the nervous system and access honestyHow EMDR therapy is being used not just for betrayed partners, but for involved partners carrying shameThe difference between trauma-informed self-care (including something as simple as a daily walk) and formal trauma treatmentWhere to start if you've had an affair and haven't yet done any real inner workDr. Thompson is direct, warm, and grounded in current science, and she brings a genuinely non-judgmental lens to a topic that is easy to oversimplify. Whether you're the person who was betrayed, the one who broke trust, or a couple trying to figure out what real recovery looks like together, this conversation offers something worth sitting with.LINKS and EXTRASEpisoded Page: https://www.affairhealing.com/podcasts/062Dr. Monique Thompson’s Website: doctormoniquethompson.comMonique’s Book: Infidelity Recovery Workbook for Couples: Tools and Exercises to Rebuild Your RelationshipThe Understanding WHY Course & Coaching: AffairHealing,com/why
June 17, 202635min
Number 2: Bonus: Beyond Infidelity
This bonus episode is an introduction to Tim Tedder’s upcoming interview with therapist and writer Lauren LaRusso, author of the book Beyond Infidelity: How to Turn the End of Your Relationship into the Beginning of Your Life. In this episode, Tim talks about the book, explains why he recommends it, and plays clips from his conversation with Lauren.LINKS and EXTRASEpisode Page: https://www.affairhealing.com/podcasts/072Buy Beyond Betrayal on AmazonRead Tim’s review of Beyond Betrayal
September 05, 20267min
Number 3: The Patterns We Learn: Attachment Styles, Infidelity, and the Road Back
Long before we could think about it, we learned how close was safe to get. Those patterns (researchers call them attachment styles) quietly shape how we handle conflict, disappointment, and closeness for the rest of our lives.Bev Mitelman, founder of Securely Loved, joins Tim to explain the four attachment styles and how they show up in infidelity: why the dismissive-avoidant pattern carries the highest risk of cheating, why betrayal cuts so deeply for the anxious-preoccupied partner, and why fixing the marriage without examining the pattern rarely holds. Tim shares his own story, and Bev names his pattern before he reveals his quiz results.Understanding the pattern is not the same as being excused by it, and if these patterns were learned, they can be changed.LINKS and EXTRASEpisode Page: https://affairhealing.com/podcasts/071Bev Midelman’s Website: https://securelyloved.comTake the free Attachment Quiz!Understanding WHY Course & CoachingNeed personal help? Schedule a Session with one of our coaches.
August 27, 202641min
Number 4: When Betrayal Begins Before an Affair
In this first PageTalk episode of the podcast, Tim revisits his recent article The Betrayal Often Begins Before the Affair, which was posted on AffairHealing.com. Written after the release of the previous episode (Unshakeable), the article explores how betrayal often begins long before an affair, in the quiet erosion of a couple's emotional connection. Tim shares his own reflection on breaking his marriage promises years before his affair began, then makes room for another side of the story: a conversation with Steve, a client who felt the article told only half the truth. Steve describes years of feeling emotionally shut out by his wife before his own affair, and Tim uses the conversation to explore Esther Perel's insight that "the victim of the affair is not always the victim of the marriage," suggesting that both partners in a struggling marriage can find the humility to look back and the hope to move forward.LINKS and EXTRASEpisode Page: https://www.affairhealing.com/podcasts/065Article: The Betrayal Often Begins Before the AffairBuilding US Course & CoachingPodcast Episode: A Conversation with My Ex, part 1Need personal help? Schedule a Session with one of our coaches.
July 09, 202615min
Number 5: Understanding EMDR: It’s Weird, but It Works
If you've been betrayed, you already know that the pain doesn't stay in the past. It follows you into ordinary moments—a song, a smell, a place, a glance at a phone—and suddenly you're flooded all over again. That's not weakness; it’s trauma. It deserves real treatment.In this episode, I talk with Laurel van der Toorn, trauma therapist and founder of Laurel Therapy Collective, about a modality that has helped many betrayed partners move out of that cycle of activation: EMDR.Laurel is refreshingly honest about it. She calls it "weird," and she means it. But weird doesn't mean ineffective. EMDR is one of the most empirically validated trauma treatments available, with decades of peer-reviewed research behind it. And for people stuck in the relentless loop of betrayal trauma, it may offer something that talk therapy alone often can't: relief at the neurological level.In this conversation, we cover:What trauma actually is and why it's less about what happened and more about how the brain stored itWhy EMDR feels strange but works, and what bilateral stimulation actually does in the brainThe eight phases of EMDR, from history-taking and resourcing all the way through processing and integrationWhat a typical session looks like, whether in-person or virtualHow targets are identified and why the most activating memory isn't always the most obvious oneWhy relational trauma (like betrayal) takes longer to process than a single-incident traumaHow to find a qualified EMDR therapist, and what certifications actually meanLaurel also addresses common concerns, including whether EMDR is a form of hypnosis (it's not), whether you can do it on your own with an app (you shouldn't), and whether it works for everyone (nothing does, but the results can be remarkable).If you're past discovery and still not sleeping, still flooded with intrusive thoughts, still wondering if it ever gets better… this episode is for you.LINKS and EXTRASEpisoded Page: https://www.affairhealing.com/podcasts/063Laural’s Website (free EMDR webinar): laureltherapy.netEMDR website: emdria.orgOur Coach & Therapist, Sharon Barbour, also offers EMDR to clients in California & Indiana.Need personal help? Schedule a Session with one of our coaches.
June 25, 202623min