P2YL BOOK RECOMMENDATION | 46. Leave a Cheater, Gain a Life
The Chump Lady’s Survival Guide, by Tracy Schorn
When the idea came to me for writing Part 2 Of Your (Love?) Life: reclaiming love and feminine confidence, it was because I couldn’t get on with so many of the books currently written about divorce which had been caused by a spouse’s unfaithfulness and desertion.
Yes, we are all imperfect, but I felt there was something intrinsically wrong with the premise that the marriage, and the faithful partner, must be lacking in some way to ‘cause’ infidelity.
It’s a form of victim-blaming so subtle we don’t even see it.
I’m more in agreement with Hope from Thirtysomething (remember that series?) when she declared of an acquaintance who had walked out on his marriage:
‘I don’t think his marriage failed.
I think he failed.
I think he had a perfectly flawed, regular marriage,
like everybody else,
and he couldn’t handle it.’
Now at last I come across a book that brings the balance back.
Leave a Cheater, Gain a Life: the Chump Lady’s Survival Guide, by Tracy Schorn (Philadelphia: Running Press, 2016)
New edition due September 2026
What I loved about it
Tracy Schorn wants to change the narrative around affairs, and she does it in a punchy and amusing way, liberally illustrated by her own cartoons.
It makes you laugh and feel strengthened, even through heartbreak.
Some busted myths
She stands up to the Hollywood assertion that couples who cheat are justified because their ‘needs aren’t being met’.
Oh those poor, unfortunate, star-crossed lovers.
Why is this myth so profitable?
She points out that the whole reconciliation-and-counselling-industrial-complex puts the onus on the already devastated, betrayed partners to agonise over their own failings that ‘made’ this happen.
This book points out what used to be considered plain truth: the major failing is on the cheater’s side. They seemed to have a sense of entitlement that made them think they had a ‘right’ to cheat.
Nobody ‘makes’ someone else take their clothes off etc etc for heaven’s sake.
Key takeaways
You cannot ‘affair-proof’ your marriage no matter what a magazine article tells you.
- So do not blame yourself for someone else’s behaviour. You can only control your own behaviour, not your spouse’s.
‘The fine art of no-contact.’ No-contact with an ex-spouse really is the most dignified, most healing way forward.
- I’m glad my own split happened before social media had really got going and there was no opportunity or temptation to keep tabs on another.
- Contact is necessary if there are children involved but Tracy Schorn shows you how to handle it in a strictly ‘this is business and nothing else’ way that minimises the pain and avoids the fallout for you.
‘Getting to meh.’ Meh is the stage where the pain is fading and Tracy reassures you it will happen.
Forgiveness is: ‘I didn’t kill you so consider yourself forgiven.’
- Sometimes that’s the best we can do for the time being. Don’t beat yourself up if you currently feel forgiveness is a dirty word.
Gaining a life: love again. ‘Do not let your cheater be the last thing you ever invested in.’
- Yes, you can have a beginning built on fresh foundations. I did, and so can you.
‘Fix your picker.’ The ‘picker’ is your personal heart–brain mix that helps you decide who to love and trust in future.
As she describes:
I’m about as sure of my [new] husband as I am of anyone,
and I watched his character very closely before I ever committed to him….
But if he snowed me, God help me, I would move on.
I know my worth….
I’ve had to rebuild and reinvent myself over and over and over again.’
I'm in total agreement with Tracy on this, and would like to add:
🌱🍃🌿
