Why He Disappeared (Or Will): For The One Who Had The Affair

Healing the Mind’s Battle Between What Was Real and What Wasn’t

Jun 02, 2025

By Iris Lennox

I’ll never forget the day my affair partner turned his back on me and disappeared.

I felt like I was going to die.

One of the most difficult parts of the healing journey for me—and for my husband—has been knowing that I was in love with the affair partner (AP). I gave the AP everything a woman can give a man, and in my experience of the affair as it was happening, he was fully engaged and present with me too—reciprocating not only in affection but in the kind of vulnerability and ease that made it feel as if both of us were opening up in ways we hadn’t with anyone else. I think the AP said it best when he told me that parts of him he thought he had lost long ago were finding a home in me. The way I would have said it is that where I withheld pieces of myself even from others who had been close to me throughout my life, those pieces felt safe with him.

I mourned the loss of my AP for nearly two years.

For a long time after he disappeared, I continued writing to him. If I had it to do over again, I would not make that same choice as I can see now that it not only kept me in the affair longer, it also probably fueled the AP’s need for affirmation and hoping he would reply kept me off balance for much than was necessary. That said . . . from what I could tell, he had blocked me from most spaces, but there came a time when I could see that my messages were at least being “delivered” to his phone. So that’s where I wrote to him until sometime in October 2024. Who knows if he was actually the one reading them. Part of the reason I continued to write was that I missed him. I wanted him to come back. I was having a bone-chilling, heartbreaking, gut-wrenching time letting go, and a lot of the menacing nature of that tearing away came because he left without the benefit of offering me any form of closure. And so, in his absence, I had to try to bring closure for myself. That was a terrible process for several reasons:

I didn’t want to close the relationship for a long time.
I had come to know my AP quite well. The day my husband confronted him, his words and actions did not align at all with the words and actions I had come to know for six months. That chasm left a large gorge of cognitive dissonance that I kept filling with the benefit of the doubt for the AP. Even when my counselors told me differently, when my husband told me differently, when my best friend told me differently, I thought (and sometimes said through various sentiments), “I think he still loves me, but he just had to disappear because that’s what the church would have expected and his wife would have demanded.” I made excuses for him rather than seeing what he did and simply taking it at face value. I kept weighing my memories against the harsh reality of the present moment, and my memories won. Over and over again for a long time.
It was also a terrible process because for six months I had begun deconstructing my life with my husband and building a life with the AP. I wouldn’t have known to say it that way while it was happening, but the AP became the recipient of all of the big and small moments in each of my days. He won my affection, my attention, and my love. As I’ve written about in detail elsewhere, it took me a long time to deconstruct something that, frankly, I didn’t want to deconstruct . . . until I did.

I’m sharing this vulnerable part of my story today because every time I hear from a new woman who has had an affair and finds herself where I once was, I feel compelled to show her she is not alone.

Why Affairs End When the Cost Becomes Too High

My experience with my AP is not an isolated story. Psychological and relationship research consistently shows that most affairs end abruptly the moment the personal, professional, or social cost of exposure grows too high for at least one of the affair partners to bear. In her landmark book, Not “Just Friends”, Shirley Glass writes:

“An affair requires deception and secrecy, and it always involves risk. The moment the affair is exposed or even threatened with exposure, the powerful cocktail of secrecy and passion that sustained it begins to collapse” (Glass, 2003, p. 34).

The key insight here is that affairs thrive on secrecy. As soon as exposure is possible, the affair partner’s risk calculus changes dramatically. Research by Perel (2017) and Spring (1996) echoes this: when the affair threatens to destroy the affair partner’s existing life or public image, self-preservation usually trumps affection. For the person left behind—often the other affair partner—this abrupt reversal can be disorienting. The love they thought was mutual can vanish in an instant, leaving them to question everything they believed about the relationship.

The Power of Cognitive Dissonance

What makes the sudden disappearance of the affair partner so traumatic is the powerful psychological phenomenon of cognitive dissonance. Coined by social psychologist Leon Festinger in 1957, cognitive dissonance refers to the inner conflict we feel when our deeply held beliefs or desires clash with new evidence or actions that contradict them. This tension creates a state of mental discomfort that the mind is driven to resolve.

In the context of an affair, cognitive dissonance emerges when the partner who once whispered promises of belonging and connection abruptly disappears—often without a word of explanation. For the one left behind, the mind is now pulled in two directions:

On one hand, “The relationship felt genuine, intimate, and meaningful.”

On the other hand, “The affair partner has vanished without explanation, leaving me to wonder if it was ever real at all.”

The dissonance here is not just a clash between two pieces of information—it is compounded by the affair itself. Affairs inherently involve secrecy, moral compromise, and the betrayal of another relationship. This adds a third layer of conflict: The relationship was built on secrecy, betrayal, and a mix of fantasy, risk, and chemistry, making it even harder to separate what was truly real from what was driven by those intoxicating forces.

This layered dissonance is excruciating because it threatens the very foundation of trust and self-worth. To resolve the pain of cognitive dissonance, the mind typically follows one of two paths:

Reconciling the relationship for what it truly was—acknowledging that the affair partner’s disappearance signals that the relationship was not built on mutual commitment or honesty. This path is painful because it means accepting that the connection you believed in was not as secure as it felt.
Inventing a narrative to preserve the affair partner’s image—finding ways to justify the silence or disappearance to protect the sense of closeness and specialness you felt. Often, this takes the form of “He left because he had to, not because he wanted to” or “He still loves me, but he’s trapped by other obligations.”
For Christians, declaring it was sinful and therefore must be abandoned—some will close the dissonance simply by calling the affair a sin and severing ties. While this can be a helpful first step, it can also bypass the grief and confusion that still need to be named and healed.
For Christians who already knew the affair was sinful, recognizing that moral clarity alone is not enough—this final, deeper path involves seeing how secrecy, fantasy, and unmet needs blurred the lines of your heart, even when your mind knew it was wrong. This honest reckoning, naming both the sin and the real pain, creates space for true healing.

I was stuck in cognitive dissonance for a long time. For me, it was because I knew the relationship was sinful right from the beginning. I knew what it could cost and then I chose to walk into it anyway. So, the way I walked in was the way I had to walk out, with my eyes wide open. For me, personally, what we built (or I built), I also had to decontruct, which I write about HERE. Had I simply called it sin and walked away, never to speak of it again, I would have buried the relationship and all that went with it—love, hope, questions, desires, laughter, and discussions of future plans—and that buried seed would have continued to grow.

Why Cognitive Dissonance Feels So Disorienting

Psychologists have shown that humans are wired to resolve cognitive dissonance—it’s not just a thought process; it’s a physiological stress response (Harmon-Jones & Harmon-Jones, 2007). When there’s a gap between what we believe and what we see, the body and brain activate a state of alarm: heart rate spikes, cortisol levels rise, and the mind scrambles to re-establish a coherent worldview.

For someone who’s had an affair, this means that even clear evidence of the partner’s betrayal, like disappearing without discussion or closure, can feel almost impossible to accept. Research by Aronson (1999) confirms that the more emotionally invested you are in the relationship, the harder it is to accept information that challenges its legitimacy. In other words, the more you gave of yourself, the more likely you are to invent excuses or rationalizations rather than accept that the affair partner didn’t value you in the same way, or at all.

How This Played Out for Me and What Research Confirms About Attachment Styles

Like many others who have been in this position, I spent nearly two years in that second camp. I believed my AP’s silence wasn’t about me—I thought it was about the impossible choice he faced, the pressure of the church, and the expectations of his family. My mind kept replaying every tender exchange, every moment that felt real, refusing to believe that he could discard it all so easily. I wasn’t just fighting to keep the memory of the AP—I was fighting to keep the story of us alive, because it had become part of my story too.

Yet the evidence from psychological studies suggests otherwise. In most cases, the affair partner’s choice to disappear is not about preserving love for either partner—it’s about self-preservation. Shirley Glass (2003) and Janis Spring (1996) both emphasize that when an affair comes under threat of exposure, the affair partner’s primary concern becomes protecting his own life and identity. The abruptness of the disappearance is not about the value of the relationship, it’s about risk and reputation management. This pattern is not unique to your story or mine; it’s a well-documented psychological response.

Research also highlights how this abrupt end can amplify trauma for the one left behind. Studies on attachment theory (Mikulincer & Shaver, 2016) show that when a relationship ends suddenly and without closure, the mind doesn’t just lose the other person, it also loses a part of the self that had become woven into that relationship. The bonds we form in intimate relationships—especially those that feel emotionally consuming—become part of our internal landscape. We don’t just see the other person as separate; we incorporate them into our identity, our sense of security, and our understanding of who we are.

As Esther Perel writes in The State of Affairs, “The quality of our relationships determines the quality of our lives. When we open ourselves to love, we give someone the power to rewrite our story. Affairs remind us of our longing for connection, but when they end abruptly, they leave us untethered—haunted by what was and what was never meant to be.”

That’s why when the affair ends abruptly, it feels like a shattering of the self. You’re not just grieving him or her, you’re grieving the part of yourself that felt seen, alive, and deeply connected in their presence. Attachment research shows that when these bonds are broken without explanation, the body and mind experience a kind of psychic rupture (Hazan & Shaver, 1987). It can feel like a free fall: the ground of what was once safe and familiar is gone.

Attachment theory also underscores that healing from attachment ruptures usually depends on having a secure base—someone safe and trustworthy to help you make sense of what happened. But secrecy isolates you from that healing context, intensifying the sense of loss and disorientation.

For example, I know now that I have an anxious attachment style. I long for connection and tend to blame myself when relationships of any kind end. This meant that my AP’s disappearance didn’t just feel like losing him; it felt like losing my own worth. Every quiet moment afterward was filled with questions: What did I do wrong? Why wasn’t I enough? The combination of secrecy, loss, and an anxious attachment style can create an overwhelming cycle of self-blame and longing that can feel almost impossible to break.

Understanding attachment styles can help clarify why these endings feel so destabilizing. Psychologists have identified four main attachment styles that shape how we bond and respond to loss:

Secure Attachment:
Feels comfortable with closeness and can ask for help when needed. This style is associated with resilience in the face of loss.

Anxious Attachment:
Fears abandonment and tends to blame themselves when relationships end. This style can amplify feelings of desperation and self-doubt after the affair partner’s disappearance.

Avoidant Attachment:
Feels discomfort with too much closeness and may withdraw quickly to avoid conflict. In affairs, this can mean the partner who disappears may have been avoidant and quick to vanish when things got complicated.

Fearful-Avoidant (Disorganized) Attachment:
Struggles with both wanting closeness and fearing it. This style can lead to turbulent push-pull dynamics in secret relationships and especially intense cognitive dissonance when the affair ends abruptly.

When an affair ends without closure, those with anxious or fearful-avoidant attachment styles can feel especially overwhelmed—caught in a cycle of self-blame, longing, and shame. Recognizing how these patterns work doesn’t erase the pain, but it can offer a framework to begin separating your sense of self from the affair’s abrupt end.

This doesn’t mean your feelings weren’t real. Cognitive dissonance doesn’t invalidate the love you felt. It doesn’t erase the moments of tenderness or the parts of you that bloomed in that secret garden. But it does help explain why it felt so devastating and confusing when the affair partner left. Your mind was trying to hold onto the story that had carried you through the affair. The story that said, “We’re different. We’re special. He loves me too.”

What the research confirms—and what I had to learn for myself—is that the pain of this ending is not proof that you were worthless or that your love was an illusion. It’s proof that human attachment is powerful, that secrecy is intoxicating, and that when a relationship ends abruptly, the mind will do everything it can to make sense of the void.

Why Knowing All This is Helpful

Understanding cognitive dissonance is not just an academic exercise. It’s a tool for your healing. It helps you see that the pain and confusion you’re feeling are normal, predictable responses to an abrupt end, especially one without closure.

Research on cognitive dissonance (Festinger, 1957) and later studies on cognitive reappraisal (Gross, 1998; Ochsner & Gross, 2005) show that one of the most effective ways to reduce the distress caused by cognitive dissonance is to reframe how we interpret the experience. Cognitive reappraisal—also called cognitive reframing—is the practice of deliberately changing the way you think about a situation in order to change how you feel about it.

For example, if your mind is stuck in the thought, “I wasn’t enough for him to stay,” cognitive reappraisal invites you to pause and look at the situation through a different lens: “His choice to leave wasn’t about my worth; it was about his need to protect himself and avoid consequences.” This shift doesn’t erase the pain, but it softens the shame and self-blame that keep you trapped.

The power of cognitive reappraisal lies in how it calms the nervous system. Research shows that reappraising a painful event can lower stress hormones like cortisol (Denson et al., 2012) and help the brain integrate the experience more safely (Siegel, 2010). When you can see the story more accurately, you’re no longer fighting yourself, you’re grounding yourself in truth.

Here’s a simple way to practice cognitive reappraisal if you’re caught in the swirl of dissonance:

Name the dissonance out loud: “I feel like I wasn’t enough, but I also know he left to protect himself.”
Acknowledge the pain without self-blame: “It hurts that he left, but it doesn’t mean I am unworthy of love.”
Reframe the meaning: “His choice was about his fear, not about my value.”

Over time, these small reappraisals create a new narrative. One that doesn’t diminish what you felt but also doesn’t leave you stuck in the belief that your worth depended on him.

By naming cognitive dissonance for what it is and practicing reappraisal, you can begin to step out of the endless cycle of self-blame and doubt. You can start to see that the affair partner’s silence or disappearance wasn’t a reflection of your worth—it was a reflection of his need to protect himself at the expense of the truth.

And that clarity is the first step to reclaiming your power.

A Final Word for the Man or Woman Searching for Answers

If you’re searching for answers today—if you’re trying to understand why the person who said they found a home in you could vanish without a word—I want to tell you what I’ve learned:

It’s not because what you shared wasn’t real to you. It’s not because you’re unworthy of love. It’s because the moment your affair partner realizes they might lose their comfort and stability, they will almost always choose to disappear. The affair was real in the moment, but it was never built to survive the light of day.
And that’s not your fault.

Affairs don’t end well. They end in secrecy, in silence, in the quiet retreat of the one who said they loved you. Or, they end loudly, in public, and in front of people you hoped you would never disappoint in your life. But there is life on the other side of this ending—a life that doesn’t require hiding or secrecy. A life that can hold your tenderness and your grief and still move forward.

At the center of all the stories, all the rationalizations, and all the heartbreak, there is one simple truth: the affair wasn’t meant to last. And when it ends, the one who disappears isn’t the one who gets the last word. You do.

Footnotes / References:

Festinger, L. (1957). A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance. Stanford University Press.
Glass, S. (2003). Not "Just Friends": Rebuilding Trust and Recovering Your Sanity After Infidelity. Free Press.
Perel, E. (2017). The State of Affairs: Rethinking Infidelity. Harper.
Spring, J. A. (1996). After the Affair: Healing the Pain and Rebuilding Trust When a Partner Has Been Unfaithful. HarperCollins.
Harmon-Jones, E., & Harmon-Jones, C. (2007). Cognitive dissonance theory after 50 years of development. Zeitschrift für Sozialpsychologie, 38(1), 7–16.
Aronson, E. (1999). The Social Animal (8th ed.). W. H. Freeman.
Mikulincer, M., & Shaver, P. R. (2016). Attachment in Adulthood: Structure, Dynamics, and Change (2nd ed.). Guilford Press.
Hazan, C., & Shaver, P. R. (1987). Romantic love conceptualized as an attachment process. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 52(3), 511–524.
Gross, J. J. (1998). The emerging field of emotion regulation: An integrative review. Review of General Psychology, 2(3), 271–299.
Ochsner, K. N., & Gross, J. J. (2005). The cognitive control of emotion. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 9(5), 242–249.
Denson, T. F., Creswell, J. D., Terides, M. D., & Blundell, K. (2012). Cognitive reappraisal increases neuroendocrine reactivity to anger in women. Psychoneuroendocrinology, 37(11), 1840–1849.
Siegel, D. J. (2010). The Mindful Therapist: A Clinician's Guide to Mindsight and Neural Integration. W. W. Norton & Company.
Carnes, P. (2012). Out of the Shadows: Understanding Sexual Addiction (3rd ed.). Hazelden.