The Psychology Behind a Lie | Why Humans Cheat
Some people tell the truth like breathing. Others lie like their life depends on it.
The difference isn't character.
It's whether their nervous system learned that being seen meant being safe.
My client Sarah* had been faithful for 19 years. T
hen, at her brother's funeral, she met someone who knew nothing about her family's carefully constructed facade. Within weeks, she was living a double life that would have shocked anyone who knew her as the perfect daughter, wife, and mother.
"I don't even know who I am anymore," she sobbed in my office. "I've become everything I was raised to despise."
But I saw something else: A woman whose body had never learned it was safe to want anything for herself.
The Neuroscience of Living Double Lives
Peter Levine's groundbreaking work in "Waking the Tiger" revealed how trauma isn't stored in our stories—it's stored in our nervous systems. When animals can't complete their natural response to threat, they shake it off. When humans can't, we fragment.
Recent infidelity research confirms what trauma therapists see daily:
- 44% of cheating men had affairs with coworkers—people who knew their "work self"
- 53% of cheating women had affairs with friends—people who knew their "social self"
- Almost none had affairs with people who knew their whole self
The Neuroscience of Living Double Lives
Peter Levine's groundbreaking work in "Waking the Tiger" revealed how trauma isn't stored in our stories—it's stored in our nervous systems. When animals can't complete their natural response to threat, they shake it off. When humans can't, we fragment.
Recent infidelity research confirms what trauma therapists see daily:
- 44% of cheating men had affairs with coworkers—people who knew their "work self"
- 53% of cheating women had affairs with friends—people who knew their "social self"
- Almost none had affairs with people who knew their whole self
Because for trauma survivors, there is no whole self. Just carefully managed fragments.
The Real Reason People Lie | When Truth feels Dangerous
Sarah grew up in a family where appearances were currency.
Her mother's depression? "Just tired."
Her brother's addiction? "Studying abroad."
Her father's bankruptcy? "Strategic restructuring."
By age 9, she'd learned the family’s secret rules:
- Never let anyone see the cracks
- Your feelings are less important than the family image
- If you can't say something perfect, say nothing
When Perfect Becomes Prison.
At 45, Sarah's life looked flawless:
- Successful therapist (yes, the irony wasn't lost on her)
- Stories that shifted to protect family secrets
- A marriage that felt like another performance
- A body so tight from holding secrets that she'd cracked two teeth
The Invisible Tiger That Taught Her to Hide
Levine tells the story of Nancy, who at 4 years old was strapped to an operating table for a tonsillectomy. The anesthesia only partially worked. She felt everything but couldn't move, couldn't scream. Her body wanted to fight, to flee, but couldn't.
For 20 years after, she had panic attacks. Not because she consciously remembered the surgery, but because her body remembered being trapped.
Sarah's surgery, unlike Nancy’s, was emotional.
Trapped between family loyalty and personal truth.
At her brother's funeral—the family secret-keeper, gone—her body's solution emerged: Find someone outside the system. Someone who didn't need her to maintain the facade.
If you Listen Closely, You’ll Hear How The Body Keeps Secrets
"Show me what happens in your body when you imagine telling your mother the truth about the affair," I suggested.
Her system locked down. Breathing slowed. Face went pale.
"Now imagine telling Marcus how you feel." Her chest expanded.
Color returned to her face. Her hands, which had been clenched, softened.
"My body can't tell the difference between my family and danger," she whispered.
This is what somatic therapy reveals: The body's wisdom is always trying to protect us.
Her affair wasn't moral failure. It was a 9-year-old's survival strategy still running in a 45-year-old's body.
Learning to Inhabit One Truth - The Doorway to Real Freedom
We started where Levine always starts: with the body. I offered some somatic informed exercises to begin the process of healing. Here are some, below.
The Family Secret Exercise:
- Write one true thing about your family each day
- Notice what happens in your body -
Stay with the sensation without fixing or fleeing
- Let your nervous system learn: Truth won't destroy you
The Telling Truth Practice:
- Start with tiny truths: "I'm tired." "I'm not okay."
- Notice what happens in your body when you're honest
- Stay with the sensation without running
- Let your nervous system learn: Truth doesn't equal family betrayal
Discharging Old Survival Energy:
Sarah's family had taught her to be silent. We used Levine's "Voo" breath:
- Deep inhale
- Long "Vooooo" on exhale from deep in the belly
- Feel the vibration break up the frozen silence
- Let your body remember it has a voice
The Courage to Be One Person
Sarah ended the affair. Not from guilt, but from clarity. "I don't want another secret life. I want one real one." The real work began with her husband.
For the first time in 20 years, she told him the truth—not just about the affair, but about the suffocating weight of being the family's image manager.
"I've been lying since before I met you," she told him. "Not about other men. About who I really am."
His response surprised them both: "I know. I've been waiting 20 years for you to trust me with the real you."
When Honesty Becomes Possible & New Doors Open
Sarah's brother died holding their father's affairs, their mother's overdoses, their family's financial crimes. His body couldn't hold any more secrets. It gave out at 42.
Sarah chose differently.
She let her body rebel before it broke.
Research shows that relationships can survive infidelity when couples address the underlying trauma.
But it requires understanding that some people's nervous systems are wired for honesty, while others are wired for survival.
The difference? Whether their early environment taught them that being seen meant being safe or being annihilated.
Sarah is learning what her body never knew: That she can be one person. That truth won't kill her. That being known—really known—might actually feel like coming home.
For Therapists Working with Family Loyalty Binds Remember:
- Affairs often aren't about the marriage but about the prison of perfection
- The body needs to learn safety before honesty is possible
- Family secrets create somatic prisons that require somatic keys
- Integration happens slowly, one truth at a time
The question isn't "How could you betray your family?" It's "How long has your body been betraying you to protect them?"
Because some of us learned to breathe. And some of us learned to hide.
Ready to help clients break free from generational patterns of silence?
Learn more and apply for our Trauma Mastery Program for advanced training and consultation on somatic approaches to family loyalty binds.
Until next time,
Xx,
Esther
*All information has been changed to protect client confidentiality.