The dialogue and reflection prompts below are illustrative teaching examples.
“I need you to show me that you’re committed.”
Okay. But show you how?
Let’s stay with that for a moment. When you say commitment, what are you hoping will happen? What would your partner say or do that would allow you to think, yes, this is someone who is willing to work on our relationship?
Perhaps you want them to return to a conversation they left unfinished. To answer a question without making you feel guilty for asking it. To take some initiative, so you don’t have to be the one bringing everything up again.
Now we’re getting somewhere. Because “I’m committed” can mean one thing to you and something quite different to the person saying it.
And after infidelity, that difference matters.
You may hear a promise and still wonder, but where do I experience that promise in the way we are together?
This is where I want to begin with boundaries. What do you need to be able to be in this relationship? What matters enough that you cannot keep putting it aside?
You don’t need to have decided whether you’re staying or leaving to ask yourself those questions. You can still love someone. You can still hope. And you can want to understand what, exactly, you are being asked to continue with.
When you say “commitment,” what do you mean?
It’s a big word, commitment. So are honesty, respect and effort. We can use them in a conversation and believe we’ve understood each other, when we haven’t really said what we mean yet.
Imagine saying, “I need you to make more effort.” Your partner says, “But I am making an effort.” And there you are, back in the same conversation.
So let’s bring it closer to daily life.
What is the effort you’re asking for? Is it making time to talk? Telling you about contact with the other person without waiting for you to discover it? Following through on something you agreed?
Try finishing this sentence:
“When I say I need commitment, what I need to see is…”
You might find that the answer is quite simple. You might find that you don’t know yet. That’s a place to begin, too.
And let me be clear here: you are not responsible for finding the perfect words that will make your partner honest. You can explain what matters to you. Their willingness to respond belongs to them.
Your needs have a place in this conversation
Perhaps you’re thinking, I shouldn’t have to ask for this.
I understand that objection. You may already have explained yourself many times. You may be tired of being the person who notices, asks, reminds and then checks whether anything happened.
There is a question worth pausing with: am I trying to understand what I need, or am I trying to find another way to persuade someone to meet a need they already understand?
Those are different conversations.
If you’re still finding your own words, take a little space. What is happening that you cannot keep accepting? What would you need to experience instead?
If you have been clear and the answer keeps being avoidance, dismissal or refusal, that answer deserves your attention as well. You don’t have to keep improving the explanation before you’re allowed to consider your choices.
Having a need does not mean you are making everything about yourself. Your needs belong in the relationship, too.
A request asks for something. A boundary brings you back to your choices.
Let’s take honesty as an example.
“I need honesty” tells your partner something important about you. But you may need to go a little further to explain the action you’re asking for:
“If that person contacts you, will you tell me, rather than wait for me to ask?”
That’s a request. Your partner can answer it. You can check that you both understand what you’re agreeing to. If you both accept it, you have an agreement.
Your boundary concerns what you are willing to participate in, and what you can choose if an essential condition is missing. For example:
“I’m not willing to keep discussing reconciliation while contact is being concealed. If that continues, I will step back from those discussions and get support to consider my next step.”
This is an invented example. It isn’t a decision you have to make, or a sentence you have to use. A boundary needs to fit your circumstances and involve something you can realistically and safely do.
The question is: what is within my choice here? You cannot make another person follow an agreement. You can consider what their response means for your participation.
If you want to explore that distinction further, you can read about why and how to set boundaries.
“I’ve changed.” Okay—what changes between us?
Someone can be learning a great deal about themselves. They may have new insight, new language, a whole new understanding of their life.
And you may be sitting beside them thinking, I’m glad you understand yourself better. But I still don’t know what that means for us.
That is the part I want to look at.
When a difficult question comes up, can they stay present enough to answer it? When they avoid something they agreed to do, can they acknowledge it? Do they make room for the impact of their choices, even when it is uncomfortable to hear?
Personal insight has a place. You can appreciate it. You can also ask how it is finding its way into the relationship.
You don’t have to feel ready to trust because your partner feels ready to move forward.
The Gottman Institute’s guidance on affairs also discusses communicating what repair requires, alongside the unfaithful partner’s responsibility to answer honestly and take responsibility. The conversation needs room for both your needs and their accountability.
If you were the person who was unfaithful
There is something for you to look at here, too.
When your partner says, “I need more from you,” do you find yourself explaining everything you have already done? You may want your effort to be seen. But before you defend it, can you find out what they are saying is still missing?
An invented example might sound like this:
“When you say you still feel alone in this, I want to understand. What happened that left you feeling that way?”
Then leave room for the answer. You may hear something you thought you had addressed. You may hear something you hadn’t considered.
And bring your own attention to repair. Your partner should not have to organise every part of your accountability. If you avoided a question, you can return to it. If you broke an agreement, you can name that before being confronted.
“I said I would come back to this conversation, and I didn’t. I want to acknowledge that and ask whether you’re willing to talk now.”
These are teaching examples. They don’t earn forgiveness or settle whether the relationship continues. Your partner gets to make that choice for themselves.
What is this agreement meant to help with?
After an affair, you may consider agreements about contact, conversations or digital transparency. Before agreeing, take time to understand what each person is actually consenting to.
What concern are you addressing? What does the agreement involve? When will you look at it again to see whether it is useful?
An agreement about access to a phone, for example, cannot answer every question about honesty or closeness. You still need to understand what it offers, what its limits are and whether both people freely consent. This article does not recommend secret monitoring or coerced access.
And if raising your needs brings threats, intimidation or fear of retaliation, seek confidential individual support before trying these conversations together.
Come back to what actually happened
Suppose you agree to return to a difficult conversation after taking a pause. When you look at that agreement again, begin there. Did you return to it? Was there room for both people to speak? What remained unfinished?
You are learning something about how the agreement works in your actual lives.
Perhaps it was unclear. Perhaps there was a difficulty that someone acknowledged openly. Perhaps something was concealed again. Those circumstances matter; you don’t have to treat them as equivalent.
A review date gives you a chance to look together. It does not become the date by which you must feel better, forgive or trust.
And if an agreement is kept, you’re allowed to notice that without deciding it is enough. If it is repeatedly broken, you’re allowed to take that seriously without explaining it away.
Before the next conversation, listen to your own answer
Here are three sentences you can try privately:
“What matters to me here is…”
“What I want to ask for is…”
“If that isn’t available, what I need to consider for myself is…”
Then read them back. Do they say what you mean? Is there something you have softened because you’re afraid it will sound like too much? Is the choice you’re considering one you can actually make, with support if you need it?
You don’t have to turn this into a final decision today. You are giving yourself a chance to hear what you need, and to look at whether it has a place in the relationship being offered.
You were not responsible for someone else’s decision to deceive you. Failing to name a boundary earlier does not change that.
For the wider picture, you can read about rebuilding trust after infidelity.
Would it help to talk this through?
If you’re finding it difficult to hear your own needs in the middle of everything that has happened, we can start there. You don’t need to have decided what comes next.
