So as a doctor and as someone who has a lot of authority in this field, Dr. Cathy, I'd like to hear your take on this and what your thoughts are on it.

Yeah, yeah.

I wish people could be completely better in a month.

That would be amazing.

And if I had a magic wand, I would be tapping it on everybody so that that could happen.

But this is a long journey, right? That's why I like to conceptualize it as a fair mountain, right? We're hiking over a mountain.

We're not hiking over a speed bump.

And

Women, [laughs] women reported experiencing more limerence-

limerence-During the affair than men.

So first of all, I want an, an explanation of what limerence is, 'cause I hear it all the time, right? [laughs] And I don't know that everyone knows what it means.

Mm-hmm.

And then, then we're gonna discuss that question.

So, lim- Yeah ... what is limerence? Yeah.

Limerence is sort of this fantasy that you project onto somebody else, and this feeling of intense love and obsession that's not really, you know, kind of backed up by reality, right? Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

If these are the narratives that we commonly accept, what do the narratives actually look like? How would you boil this all down for me?

Yeah, I mean, I, you know, I really push back whenever anybody says, oh, cheaters are just horrible people.

They have awful characters.

They have a big character defect.

No, I mean, several different research studies that have been done historically have shown us that our judgment, our character, our morality is more flexible than we'd like to admit.

When we're in enough emotional pain and the situation seems dire enough, we're going to choose anything that makes that situation better.

Now, I'm never, ever justifying affairs.

What are some of the things you're talking about?

... not strayed.

No. No.

That is not true.

And in fact, when we do research and we ask people, "Was the primary reason that you cheated because you were sexually unsatisfied?" The answer is usually no.

In fact, it's not even in the top five reasons for why people cheat.

So I, yeah, no.

Most of the time they talk about it being a painkiller.

When you, when you're sitting in front of these, these people, these men who have been the perpetrator themselves, what does that look like to you? What are they saying that you can tell is real remorse?

What are some of the things you're talking about?

Well, so really critical things are, you know, for the straying partner to basically come clean and tell the truth about what happened.

It's way better if you get it all out rather than trickling the truth out.

but a lot of people are scared to do this.

It's incredibly important that the person who strayed provides a lot of reassurance to the betrayed partner.

That was one of the top findings of our paper is that reassurance and saying things like, I do love you.

I know I acted in ways that show I don't love you, but I want this.

So I don't know what to do here.

If these are the narratives that we commonly accept, what do the narratives actually look like? How would you boil this all down for

me? Yeah, I mean, I really push back whenever anybody says, oh, cheaters are just horrible people.

They have awful characters.

They have a big character defect.

No, I mean, several different research studies that have been done historically have shown us that our judgment, our character, our morality is more flexible than we'd like to admit.

When we're in enough emotional pain and the situation seems dire enough, we're going to choose anything that makes that situation better.

Now, I'm never, ever justifying affairs.

What are some of the things you're talking about?