Miguel continued, "If I hated you cleanly, I'd already be gone." The first couples-therapy session occurred in January. Dr. Salazar referred them to another therapist, Dr. Benjamin Cole, to keep Lucia's treatment separate from the marriage work. Ben was a Black therapist in his fifties with a quiet voice and an irritating ability to hear the argument beneath the words.
During the first session, Miguel described Sofia's affair as a demolition. Sofia described the years before it as erosion. Ben said both metaphors could be true without being equivalent.
"Erosion may explain vulnerability," he said. "It does not cause a person to choose an affair. That choice belongs to the person who made it. At the same time, if this marriage continues, you will eventually need to examine the erosion too. Not instead of the affair. After accountability for it."
Miguel appreciated the ordering.
For several sessions, they stayed almost entirely with facts and impact. Sofia had to answer questions without defending herself. Miguel had to ask only what he genuinely needed to know, not what might injure him most. Ben called the difference "information versus self-harm." Miguel stopped asking sexual details after understanding that specificity did not create safety. What he needed was the scope: duration, places, contact, lies, money spent, exposure to Lucia, and whether there were any ongoing ties.