When We Go Blind to Cheating

Why we go blind to betrayal, and how to see clearly again.

Reviewed by Margaret Foley

Key points

• What we used to call denial can actually be a complex attachment-based dynamic called betrayal blindness.
• Individuals dealing with infidelity can both know and not know what they are experiencing.
• Healing from betrayal blindness is a slow, gentle supported process.

Jayne finds sexts from a co-worker on her husband’s phone but believes him when he says it is just "horsing around."

Sam walks by a coffee shop and sees his partner holding hands with another man while in line for a drink. When she denies it was her and refuses to change her story, he lets it go.

In the past, we would label these behaviors as denial. However, today, we understand that a more complex dynamic is at play. When individuals facing the betrayal of infidelity block out information and enter the state of “knowing but not knowing,” they may be dealing with an attachment-based phenomenon called betrayal blindness. This term was first coined by Jennifer Freyd PhD, founder of betrayal trauma theory.

Betrayal blindness is an elegant solution to danger because it creates an adaptive response that solves both our need to protect ourselves from threats and our need to preserve our attachments.

Freyd says, “In this situation, it is more adaptive to not know about the trauma that is occurring. Therefore, the theory proposes, people become blind to betrayal to the extent that being aware of it would threaten a relationship in which they are dependent.”[i]

We know that our adult romantic partners are our primary attachment figures and any rupture in our secure bond is experienced as a survival-level threat. Betrayal blindness is an adaptive coping strategy that mitigates threats to our relationship by blinding us to danger. We preserve our attachment to our partner by holding information that could threaten our relationship outside our awareness.

How We Go Blind

When we experience danger, our threat response systems fire up and activate our core coping strategies of fight, flight, and freeze. Freyd has argued that betrayal blindness is an adaptive strategy that is part of the freeze response. “If we are strong enough and in a good enough situation, we confront (fight) the betrayal to correct the situation. If we cannot do that, we withdraw from the person or the situation (flight) to avoid future harm. If that option is too dangerous—for instance, because we are dependent on the betrayer—our next best defense is to block out awareness of the betrayal; in other words, a kind of mental freeze (betrayal blindness) is our next best option.”[ii]

As a result, betrayal blindness creates the pretense that our world is the way we want it to be. Betrayal blindness takes a thousand different forms, but its function is always the same—to protect us from a reality that feels too big and too difficult to handle.

The Bind That Creates the Blind

Betrayal blindness brings us right back to the key relational bind at the heart of partner betrayal trauma: the person we depend upon the most and turn to in times of trouble is now the source of our distress. Going blind to what is happening is how we attempt to deal with the no-win bind that betrayal creates.

Freyd’s research originated with the study of children dealing with betrayal traumas perpetrated by a parent or caregiver. Betrayal trauma theory homes in on the specific dilemmas and impacts created when abuse or neglect are perpetrated by the person one is attached to and dependent upon.

Because as children we are dependent upon our caregivers, we must preserve our attachment to them even if we do not receive the attention, nurture, and protection we need. As a result, children will often assume neglect or abuse is a result of something bad or wrong with themselves. This allows them to maintain their attachment to their caregivers by placing the blame for abuse or neglect on themselves.

In other words, the more important a relationship is to us, the more critical it is for us to maintain our attachment and the more vulnerable we are to betrayal blindness.

But I'm a Grown-Up

It is perhaps easy for us to see the bind children are in. It may be harder for us to understand how these same dynamics can play out in relationships between adults who have physical, cognitive, and emotional resources at their disposal and are therefore able to be independent and autonomous and survive.

Maintaining our relationship with our partner protects us from stress and danger. As a result, any adult, no matter how self-sufficient we believe ourselves to be, can become susceptible to betrayal blindness when faced with the threat created by being cheated on and chronically lied to.

Betrayal injures the safe connection at the heart of secure bonding. This attachment injury is felt as a primary danger, threatening our sense of survival. The more threatened we feel, the more we will take steps to try to preserve our attachment and therefore our survival. One effective way to preserve our sense of safe connection is to not know what we know and not see what we see, particularly if what we were to know and see would threaten our relationship.

Moving Out of Betrayal Blindness

Because betrayal blindness is a protective attachment-based coping strategy, it is important to honor its role and function. Moving out of betrayal blindness is gentle, step-by-step work and must be done with the right care and support.

One of the best ways to support betrayed partners is to address betrayal blindness in a group setting. Group learning and support help partners build the internal strength and emotional resilience needed to move from unawareness into awareness—where their emotional reality can be processed.

Working on betrayal blindness within a group provides support and community. As new information is allowed into awareness, it is held not just by the individual but by the group. The knowledge that each person within the group knows and understands the experience being processed provides a healing balm. This emotional buttress enables the betrayed partner to draw not just on their own resources but the resources of the entire group to help them hold the information and begin to digest the emotional and relational ramifications it brings.

In addition, working with an individual therapist who is trained in treating betrayal blindness and understands the many ways it manifests in the lives and relationships of betrayed partners is essential. Without clarity about how betrayed blindness impacts individual and couple dynamics, therapists can go in misguided directions regarding individual and relationship healing.

For betrayed partners, the path to healing lies in growing awareness and confidence in their ability to handle painful situations without collapsing into fear, powerlessness, or shame. When we move out of betrayal blindness and grow the capacity to deal with difficult situations and big emotions, we grow our sense of self and our belief that we are capable and resourceful and can trust ourselves.

To find a therapist, please visit the Psychology Today Therapy Directory.