Cheating can cause all sorts of drama. And often, the impacts reverberate years later. When the affair results in the breaking up of a family, things can get super messy. Because, as we know, it's never easy when kids are involved.
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A young woman has told how her dad's affair is still coming back to haunt him. Even though he's now moved on and is married to his affair partner, Lara. The former cheaters have a child together. A child who is paying the price for her parents' sins. She's being denied a relationship with her paternal grandparents. And none of the adults want to take the blame.
One teen would love to have a normal relationship with her grandparents
Image credits: gpointstudio / envato (not the actual photo)
But she's never even met them because she's the product of a messy affair
Image credits: gpointstudio / envato (not the actual photo)
Image credits: National-Property-34
What it's like to be a "secret daughter born from an affair"
So-called "affair babies" carry the burden of shame and blame. And as one woman, who herself was a "secret daughter born from an affair" revealed, there is not much support.
"Even when you cast a search out into the pool of the internet, there isn’t a lot of useful information that speaks to those in this position," wrote Shona Hendley. "Often, the narrative is toxic, focused on blame, or who is more at fault than the other – why one party is ‘bad’ and deserves to suffer the consequences of their decisions."
Hendley says this narrative just adds to the loneliness. "It seems to cement the fact that what you went through, or are going through, isn’t normal, isn’t ordinary, that you are different and that if you share this experience as a child or a parent, you have every right to be judged," she says.
After sharing her story online, other adult children with similar tales reached out to her. And this online community helps one another heal.
"For a long time, that difference shamed me," wrote Hendley. "Shame that ultimately wasn’t mine to carry. This is why I took the step to write about my experience, to peel back the layers of secrets until I chipped away enough that I could see all the way through."
In a separate piece, Hendley admits that she has good days and bad days. "Ultimately though, I have no control over any of this, just as I had no control over the circumstances of my creation," she says.
But her last few lines are perhaps the most touching: "I know that I have done what is within my power. And I know that I have been honest, brutally so; I have been brave, I have exposed myself in the most raw and vulnerable way. And most importantly, I have been myself, something that my father is still struggling to be."
A parent's infidelity can have long-lasting effects on their children
Apart from the obvious hurt and pain that children feel when their family life is rocked by a parent's affair, there are other long-term effects that can be felt by the kids for years to come.
For one, it can affect the way they view romantic relationships in the future. And even how faithful they themselves will be. Research published in the Journal of Family Issues found that children whose parents were unfaithful were twice as likely to be unfaithful themselves.
Growing up in a family with infidelity also has lasting impacts on children in terms of their ability to trust future partners. That's according to clinical psychologist Ana Nogales, who is also the author of "Parents Who Cheat: How Children and Adults are Affected When Their Parents Are Unfaithful."
In her research, Nogales found that 75% of children experience lingering feelings of betrayal toward their cheating parent, while 80% of children surveyed said that the infidelity shapes their outlook about romance and relationships. And 70% admitted the infidelity affected their general trust in others.
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