I've talked about the need for a wayward spouse to "normalize" their illicit relationship into their regular circle of friends and family, but I don't have any LIST of stages or anything.
I checked my personal archives, and this is all I could come up with:
“Normalization”
"Normalization" refers to the process a wayward spouse will go thru in order to get their circle of family and friends to accept their affair partner. It is VERY important to them that everyone do so, and it's typically part of their fantasy that "everyone will be okay," and "will all get along."
Rarely does a wayward spouse envision any push-back, or at least they vastly underestimate it.
It's also VERY much typical "script" for a cheating spouse to deny the existence of an affair partner, until some time later, AFTER the marriage is either divorced or formally separated. Then, "all of a sudden," the wayward spouse will announce to their family that "I've just met someone."
