How changing your story can change your life | Lori Gottlieb | TED

I'm going to start by telling you about an email that I saw in my inbox recently. Now, I have a pretty unusual inbox because I'm a therapist and I write an advice column called "Dear Therapist," so you can imagine what's in there. I mean, I've read thousands of very personal letters from strangers all over the world.

And these letters range from heartbreak and loss, to spats with parents or siblings. I keep them in a folder on my laptop, and I've named it "The Problems of Living." So, I get this email, I get lots of emails just like this, and I want to bring you into my world for a second

and read you one of these letters. And here's how it goes.

"Dear Therapist, I've been married for 10 years and things were good until a couple of years ago. That's when my husband stopped wanting to have sex as much, and now we barely have sex at all." I'm sure you guys were not expecting this. (Laughter) "Well, last night I discovered that for the past few months,

he's been secretly having long, late-night phone calls with a woman at his office. I googled her, and she's gorgeous. I can't believe this is happening. My father had an affair with a coworker when I was young and it broke our family apart. Needless to say, I'm devastated. If I stay in this marriage,

I'll never be able to trust my husband again. But I don't want to put our kids through a divorce, stepmom situation, etc. What should I do?" Well, what do you think she should do? If you got this letter, you might be thinking about how painful infidelity is. Or maybe about how especially painful it is here