Q. My husband has been having an affair with a barmaid for 6 months. He is not just seeing her for fun but is truly in love with her. He has a well-paid job and is a good person. He seems to have stopped seeing her for now and be making efforts to forget her, but has a difficult time doing it. He looks so depressed and almost like dying at home. Differently from the time his affair was first discovered, he says he will do his best to come back and restore family. He hardly talks and does not make any effort. I wonder what psychological condition he is in now. It seems to me that he has not sever the relationship yet and is still in infidelity.

A. The concept of love does not apply to infidelity. Infidelity is the result of relationship addiction, which is a psychological disorder. The adulteress may have met your husband for her own purpose. She may have wanted pleasure, money, and other things but your husband can mistake it for love since he has the condition of relationship addiction. Your husband can be an ideal target to take advantage of since he has a well-paid job and is a good person. He is likely to give the woman more and more as the relationship progresses. The woman will simply change men when the relationship ends for some reason. Both of them can mistake the condition for love since they are both in relationship addiction, but the fact that you also think they are in a true love indicates that you are also in a serious condition. 

Your husband is depressed not because he has lost his love but because his pleasure has stopped. His relationship addiction will be easily reactivated when he finds another women to pursue pleasure with. This is a common symptom of relationship addiction. He will display rage when things don't go his way and stay depressed when he cannot do anything as he wishes. He thinks that he wants to make efforts and restore family, but his pathological condition makes it difficult for him to put into actions. He will feel that the whole world has collapsed when the adulteress meets another man, which is actually caused by the operation of relationship addiction but mistaken for love. 

Please, keep in mind that your husband has a psychological disorder, which only he himself can treat. He will continue infidelity changing women and aggravating the condition unless he is properly treated. He may keep more than one adulteress not to lose his pleasure in case one adulteress leaves him. 

You cannot give your husband an opportunity to treat unless you treat your post traumatic stress first. It is crucial that you stop paying attention to your husband and treat post traumatic stress. Then, you will give him hope for recovery of marriage relationship based on the wife's happiness ability. 

You can tell him that you have started the treatment but don't have to force him to treat his condition. Things will only keep getting worse if you postpone your treatment and keep paying attention to your husband thinking that you will be OK only if he comes back to you. It is guaranteed that husband infidelity will recur with an advanced condition of relationship addiction and post traumatic stress will also keep getting aggravated, which will cause even more dire consequences in your life and your husband's life.

About KIP(Korea Institute of Psycho-education)