trust your intuition on infidelity

Charity didn’t need her daughter to warn her that her husband, Mike, was attracted to another woman.

"I had been having niggling doubts about Mike’s sudden propensity to come home later than usual, and I knew that these were early signs of trouble in the marriage," says Charity.

"Both my daughter and I are highly intuitive women and Mike should have known better than to try and fool us!"

If she didn’t address these niggling doubts, Charity would have ended up with obvious signs of Mike’s infidelity such as stained or perfumed clothing, another woman’s hair on his jacket or tell-tale notes in his pockets.

"These niggling doubts are part of our survival system," explains Charity. "They are part of the early warning system by which our ancestors, the cave dwellers, knew that trouble was brewing in the shape of a large, hungry beast having picked up their scent."

"We don't have to worry about large, hungry beasts these days," laughs Charity, "but our natural intuition still operates very effectively to warn us when all is not well."

"However," adds Charity, "having been socialized to ignore our intuition, to rationalize it, to believe that others know better than we do, a lot of women feel uneasy."

"They know that something is wrong but they just don't have the courage to confront the person who is ringing early alarm bells and say to him: 'I feel there is something amiss here, please tell me what is going on, I need to know as I depend upon you for (insert appropriate need)'."

"They won't act in tune with their intuition," explains Charity, "because they know it will invite ridicule and protestations from the person they're confronting."

"Even when women present their husbands with cold, hard evidence of the incongruity between his behavior and the facts he will rarely say: 'Okay, you've caught me, where do we go from here?'"

"No," sighs Charity. "Instead, an inventive male mind will find a myriad of plausible explanations for the incongruity."

"And because most women are loyal and trusting and want their marriage to succeed," says Charity, "they will give their man the benefit of the doubt. Not once. Not twice. But as many times as it takes for either the wife or the husband to wake up to themselves."

Charity believes that having the courage to trust our intuition, and act in tune with it, is basic to freeing ourselves - and those in bad situations with us - from the bizarre behavior that results from a clash between what we are socialized to do and what our inner guidance tells us to do.

"Yes," says Charity, "we need rules in all relationships to promote civilized behavior, but just like remaining stationary at a red traffic light on a deserted road at 4 a.m. is a bit silly so is taking social rules too literally in any situation."

If Charity had rationalized Mike’s odd behavior rather than listening to her inner guidance and acting on it, then she would have been caught up in a bizarre dance with him that would have ultimately led to the demise of their marriage.

Charity always listens to her inner guidance, trusts it and acts in accordance with whatever it tells her to do.

"Being an intuitive woman in charge of my life involves being very much aware of my feelings and how they are affected by the behavior of others - particularly those I love," says Charity.

"When I confronted Mike with my suspicions, he, of course, denied that he was working late because of a woman," laughs Charity. "Guilty parties always lie - I expected it."

"I reminded him of our wedding vows - particularly the one about honesty and decency should either party feel attracted to another person - and that did the trick."

"Our agreement had been to separate before an affair started, giving the other party the freedom to find another lover, too," says Charity.

"If you’re attracted to another woman," I told Mike, "then be honest with me and do the right thing by me so that I can find someone else."

"I told him that I didn't believe him - if he had been genuinely busy at work, then he’d be bringing the work home as he'd always done in the past."

"And then I requested a separation - with him leaving the house - so that he could work out his feelings."

Given this straight talk from Charity - with a penalty she fully intended to pursue - Mike was reminded why he had married her in the first place.

She’s a strong, passionate woman and he was a fool for being momentarily distracted by one of the cute young things at work.

"Mike came home earlier than usual the next day, bringing me a dozen red roses," laughs Charity.

By confronting Mike at the early signs of trouble, by trusting her intuition and by never giving the benefit of the doubt, Charity had not only avoided getting caught up in a bizarre dance with Mike but had also saved her marriage.

(Charity's story first appeared as marriage saved by intuition and is reprinted with permission.)

marital boundaries

Rhonda is 28, married without kids, and has only been out of work for two months. Already her husband, John, is resenting the fact that he’s responsible for all expenses - but Rhonda didn't expect his resentment to go as far as it did.

Rhonda was willing to excuse his stingy behavior on account of the fact that they do have heavy commitments - mortgage, car repayments and a heavy credit card debt that she, rather than John, ran up - but when he took it upon himself to post her resume online - without her permission - Rhonda was enraged.

"John maintains that he was only trying to help speed up my job searching," says Rhonda, "but what right does he have to do something like this behind my back?"

"I kept my own name when we married because I don't want to lose my identity," explains Rhonda, "but even this simple marital boundary did not prevent him from thinking that I am his property."

"John is computer semi-illiterate and I don't even know how he managed to do it," sighs Rhonda, "but I'm angry with him not just because he did it but because he doesn't understand the online job market as well as I do."

Rhonda explains that the speed and convenience of online job-hunting can trap unwary jobseekers into making some dreadful mistakes - one of which is the potential of sending your resume and personal details to bogus sites.

"John says that he only posted my resume to a few sites," says Rhonda, "but from what I can see he plastered it all over the Internet. He may as well have written my telephone number in a public lavatory!"

Rhonda is very concerned about whether or not the sites he posted her resume to are bona fide.

"I would never post my personal details online without first checking with the agency behind it, or knowing someone who has used the site and received job offers through it," explains Rhonda.

"Also," says Rhonda, "with so many people unemployed these days, what employer bothers looking at online resumes? As far as I'm concerned, all John has done is expose my personal details to prying eyes."

She checked out the sites John had posted her resume to, and only one of them had an office address and a telephone number readily available on the site. She then checked to see if the address was valid and called the number listed to inquire personally about their job matching record.

"The line was dead," cries Rhonda. "John had indeed posted my resume to a bogus site, and the other sites were even more suspicious because they had no real life contact details. How are these sites allowed to get away with that? It's cowboy land out there in cyberspace!"

Until newspapers brought in very strict rules about job advertisers, Rhonda is well aware that there were a lot of bogus operators advertising non-existent jobs just to obtain a pool of job applicants to promote their business.

Worse still, some of those job advertisements were placed by crooks.

"Predatory men placed job advertisements specific to females, and thieves placed bogus job advertisements to gain addresses and telephone numbers for convenient house-breaking."

"I'm now paranoid that our house is going to get robbed and I can't believe that John would be so dumb as to post my name, address, telephone number and personal history on the Internet," sighs Rhonda. "This is taking marital liberties way out of normal boundaries."

"Obviously," says Rhonda, "the Internet job market is slow catching up with strict rules governing privacy and job advertising. Nobody really knows whether any advertised job exists, or whether the people behind the job agency or portal are merely collecting personal data for marketing purposes."

Rhonda is not even very happy applying online for positions placed directly by well-known companies, or well-known recruiting agencies. She is well aware that any personal information sent through cyberspace could end up anywhere.

"In an employee’s job market - when labor is scarce - online resume posting could be viable," says Rhonda, "but only if resumes are strictly limited to viewing by bone fide employers."

"In an employer's job market like today's," says Rhonda, "job seekers are a dime a dozen and all John has done is devalue me more than I feel already."

"He's posted my resume to sites that are available for viewing by nosy web-surfers, and no matter how much he argues that he was only helping me find a job, I cannot forgive him."

"John tried to get around my horror at seeing my name and personal details plastered on the Internets by saying I can always use his name from now on," laughs Rhonda, "and now I'm thinking that he's not only resentful of having to support me while I'm unemployed but also that I kept my own name!"

"I love the dope but if we are to remain together then he's got to learn about marital boundaries," says Rhonda. "There are some things you just can't ride roughshod over and my private identity, separate from him, is non-negotiable."