Emotional Affairs-The Shocking Truth
66Emotional Affairs - The Shocking Truth
With the startling increase in emotional affairs, let me reveal why it is the most troublesome of affairs.
While any kind of affair will be devastating to you, emotional affairs are in some ways more potent than the typical sexual fling. While the visual thought of your partner engaging in sex with another is very shocking, discovering that they have given their heart and feelings to someone else throws you into the stomach twisting depths of painful betrayal and loss.
What makes an emotional affair even more painful is its elusive nature. When your partner has had sex with another, there is a kind of finality about it. I mean, if they have done the misdeed then you have are faced with a decision to make, of whether to work through it, or to leave.
With emotional infidelity, it proves to be a lot more complicated as nothing physical has actually happened so it becomes almost impossible to accuse, confront or prove. Yet, if you are on the receiving end it can be truly devastating.
With the incredible growth of people connecting over the internet, it has actually stemmed, or at least increased the number of emotional affairs. Due to the anonymity offered online, it has allowed us to be at our most open and vulnerable, and share our most intimate thoughts, problems and desires.
Being able to share our feelings in such an uncensored fashion by it's very nature can create a bond with a stranger. This is often followed by real feelings as the contact and emotional connection grows between the two involved.
But what are you to do if you're faced with a spouse or partner who you suspect is emotionally involved with someone else?
I will start by telling you what not to do. The biggest mistake you can make is to start accusing and meltdown into raging confrontations. This will have the opposite effect of what you want. Since there has been no physical contact it is very easy for him/her to deny anything going on.
Instead of barraging him with questions, or demanding to get assurance, or making strict requests etc, you need to work on the one thing that will help hi/her snap out of this bubble of emotional infidelity. And that is to make yourself more wanted.
You do that by improving yourself, by spending quality time with them and by rekindling all the areas of your relationship that made your partner fall in love with you in the first place.
While affairs are difficult, it is a chance for you to grow yourself. It will pay off in spades now and for the rest of your life.
If you want to find out the exact ways I learned to cope with my own experience of emotional affairs, hop over and learn how to break free from the affair
Hey, its hard to control emotional affair especially if u r not satisfied in your present relationship.Just like dreams, i think it is one way your mind is telling you that somthing is lacking.It creates a lot of stress in the relationship,and if one partner is not confident enough, such relationship may end.
I don't think there is really an increase in emotional affairs, even though it may appear so. The internet has only enabled new forms of emotional affairs, and I agree, that it has enabled us to keep our emotional affairs more private. I believe that we have only recently begun to acknowledge emotional affairs as such. According to Google Trends, the term Emotional Affair has only recently gained in popularity, with searches for that term not even registering until mid-2005. http://www.google.com/trends?q=emotional+affair
Thanks for the hub... It was very informative and has helped me to cope a little more with this horrible curve ball I have been thrown..
EA (Emotional Affairs) are hard on everybody involved. They can spring from chat rooms, old friends, ex lovers, etcera etcera. The thing is that people form bonds with people everyday and those bonds are the potential to become EA's. Or you have a case of the "always there" but never acted on emotions for someone. They pop back into your life and it's still there. Yes, It's more difficult now to get up and go because of the marital status, but you also can't break from the one that got away because there's something that keeps you there. It is worse than physically screwing because instead of thinking of your spouse, your thinking of him! and there he is just listening to you and connecting with you on a level that yours just can not. You love your husband, but you love your friend. There's alot to lose and a lot to gain. You tell yourself, I am safe because this other person lives in another State and if we took it further it would be someone making the effort to be present in the others life.
I haven't been married long,less than a year. My spouse is not a horrible man, I love him, but I have loved this other person since I was 19 and now, I am 29. I married my husband because I was ready to be a wife, and have a family. We have no kids. Before him there was a string of long relationships, most of them were nightmares and perhaps this relationship with my husband was the most sane one I have been in and thought why not. Never thought I could feel comfortable like this. The other person was also my friend. We'd talk about everything, the distance is what mainly set us apart. We hung out a few times but, we never kissed or were intimate even though that chemistry and love was always there. I keep telling myself, If I keep both relationships: Eventually I will figure out what is best for me, what I want, and what and who I can't live with out....is that crazy?
YOU are delusional........yea, make myself more f***ing attractive to stop all this shit.......................WTF!!!
I agree with szq!
What if you have evidence of contact between the two people who are having an "emotional affair"? What are you suppose to do? Even after confronting my partner, he still has contact with this other person...what then?
I do not see how making myself more attractive will help in this sort of situation. Whatever has made my partner start this affair will still be there and who is to say whether it will stop or continue. How about just calling it quits on the relationship and starting over with someone who actually will love me just as I am without making me feel inadequate...
You are blaming the victim! No! My husband had an emotional affir for 7 years with a co-worker who lived in a different state. It's worse than a physical affair; he told this woman he loved her, he told her lives about me and he even told her he had divorced me because of MY affair (there was no affair). This WAS NOT MY FAULT. I am attractive; he is just an a**hole!
So the best way deal with a physical affair is to go down on your husband more? Got it.
I sympathize with all comments. My wife is having an emotions affair with a coworker. It all started in beginning of february when she started a new job. We have a baby together and she was on her way to lose her baby weight. I always asked her to come to the gym with me, but always was hesitant. Anyway, that coworker gave her compliments, and once that done, she went to the gym to make herself sexy for this guy. She has lost 26 pounds and looks amazing, but I know she is gone now and with him. Not sure if sex was involved, but it is gearing towards that. She asked for a trial seperation but I know it is the end. I am now living a single life, bettering myself and moving forward, whatever the result. For those who are going through a simliar issue, just better yourself, do things you didnt do before, live your life, meet other people, make yourself look better so she can realized she F*&%$D UP.
Steve,
Just remember the grass isn't always greener on the other side. My ex cheated on me and he regrets it.
My current spouse has had an emotional affair with a co-worker and I was very thankful she was let go of from the company but it doesn't change the fact that I still don't trust him. Then last summer he was out with some friends and as he said had to much to drink and became way to touchy feely with a friend of ours. He says he loves me and wants only me but I can't seem to let go of what happened in the past. Sometimes I just want to walk away because I'm tired of questioning everything but I love him dearly.
I found out a couple of weeks ago that my partner had been having an emotional affair for yrs, this was only realised by accident when I heard a voicemail message on his phone, I really dont know how to go on but with 2 children I dont feel able to walk away after 14 yrs
I found out my husband was having an "emotional affair" about 6 months ago with a co-worker. The affair was going on for 2 or more years. I always feel sad and I feel the innocence of our marriage has been destroyed. I do love him and we are now going to marriage counseling, however it doesn't stop the pain or the betrayed feelings. I don't think it has anything to do with quality time I always paid attention to my husband I always keep myself physically fit. He likes attention from other women and that's what we are working on. It's a sad truth, but there are so many women who don't care if a man is married or not. And if they give that attention to a man it's hard for them to deny.
My spouse has been having an emotional affair with a coworker for 11+ years. I'm pretty sure it was physical at one point, regardless of the denials. This has continued even though they have since relocated to different parts of the country. After being told that it was over several times, only to find out that they are still talking to each other, I'm done.
My husband too, he's been having an EA for two years with a coworker, after 28 years of marriage and denies it. I've tried to repair the marriage, before I knew about the EA which explains why emotionally I couldn't get through, so it takes two, along with honesty which I've yet to get and don't expect to at this point. I'm ready to move on, this is too much and too hard to get over. Though he says every "thing" has changed, the emotions/feelings are still there. It's all still a collaborative coverup.
I am guilty of having an emotional affair. I NEVER thought such a thing would happen to me. My husband and I have been married for 25 years. Five months ago, an old boyfriend (divorced) from 33+ years ago friended me on FB. We chatted online about old times, old friends, family, etc. We shared stories about our jobs, our lives and our children. Suddenly, we were e-mailing during the work day, too. He lives in the next state over where my parents live and, the last time I visited my parents, he and I met for breakfast and then sat in his car while we looked at old yearbooks, pictures, and listened to music from our younger days. We shared a kiss when we said goodbye and when I got about five minutes down the road, I received a text from him saying he had been tempted to make a move when we were together. We continued to e-mail, text and chat via FB and our conversations grew more sexually suggestive. We eventually made plans to meet for sex. Two weeks before we were to meet, I couldn't take it any more. I was sick to my stomach and was having difficulty sleeping. I couldn't believe the person I had become! I confessed EVERYTHING to my husband. Needless to say, he was crushed and enraged at the same time. He threatened to leave and I begged him to stay. We spent the next five or six hours talking, crying and making a plan to save our marriage.
Believe me when I tell you that people who become involved in emotional affairs do so because something is missing in the marriage. In my case, there were two areas in my marriage that really troubled me. First and foremost, my husband is not (I should now say "was" not) the affectionate type. I had told him so many times that I need that ... I need someone to hold my hand occasionally, to slip an arm around my waist, wink at me from across the room or even give me a slap on the ass occasionally. We have a king-size bed and he didn't even like to touch in the bed unless we were having sex. He couldn't keep his hands off me when we first started dating 28 years ago. The second area is that we both work full-time jobs yet I have always been responsible for the majority of the household duties, yard work and finances. I can't blame him too much for that ... he and I grew up very differently - he was from a fairly privileged family where everything was done for them. I grew up in a family where we worked hard and did everything for ourselves. I was also the one who made the major decisions in our relationship. I felt more like a parent than a partner and I dreamed of a life where I could have less responsibility. Our daughter is recent college graduate so I figured I had completed my responsibility.
It has been 22 days since I told my husband everything and I do mean EVERYTHING (including our sexual conversations) and our plans to spend the night together. The very next morning, I e-mailed the old boyfriend and told him I couldn't live a lie any longer and was so ashamed of my behavior as a married woman. I told him I could not have any more contact with him. He told me he hoped things worked out for the best and told me he'd always be my friend. I think of him a lot and I miss our (non-sexual) chats and, tempting as it is to write him, I know I cannot have contact with him without having inappropriate feelings for him.
My husband and I are seeing a marriage counselor and we are making progress. He has been incredible during this time. He has been more affectionate in the past three weeks than he has been during our entire marriage. I now wait to start dinner until he gets home and we cook together and clean up together. He's picking up things and putting them away without me asking him to do so and he has actually looked at the checkbook for the first time in years. He tells me he has completely forgiven me, but I cannot forgive myself. It doesn't help that I still think of my EA guy, but not nearly as much as I did. I am consumed with guilt over what I've done to my husband. For those of you who've been hurt by a cheating spouse (and an emotional affair IS cheating), I've seen the pain it causes and I'm sorry. For those of us who have been unfaithful, I feel that pain, too. I encourage anyone who is currently involved in an emotional affair to stop immediately and cut all contact. If you can't do that, don't put your spouse through the pain ... leave them so they can at least have a chance at happiness again. Trust me, they can't be happy if you are not emotionally available.
I have these feelings...for a female friend. Yes - I am ashamed. Felt this way for about two weeks now.
To Guilty: Kudos to you on your honesty. That is refreshing to hear. I wish my husband would tell me the truth, I might think differently if so, but he continues to deny and cover it up, still calls her and sees her at work every day. So, I know he's more invested in her than me. Yes, something has been missing in our marriage too, which I had been trying to work on but it does take two to do so, and he never saw it because of her. Was trying to work through the years of baggage but this just added a much larger issue. He's trying to be the good husband now, but yet he still keeps her, no intention to stop with her. He leaves me no choice. Seven months of heartache, though it's been going on with them for two years. Should have told me years ago, we may have ended up in a better place than we are now. He should have left our marriage years ago, because he didn't have the right to crush me. Anybody remember honesty and morals??
To I'm Done: Although I am the offender in my situation, I can absolutely see your point and understand why "you're done". I can't imagine suffering through what you have for the past 11 years. Disconnecting from an EA is VERY tough but it is what's necessary for your husband to do if he has any desire at all to save your marriage. I won't lie ... I've had a very rough day today in terms of thinking of my EA. I've been so very tempted to contact him but I know it would just cause me to relapse in the progress that I've already made. I felt such a strong connection with him. I even have occasional thoughts that we are meant to be together. I want those thoughts to go away ... I want to have those thoughts and feelings for my husband! I really do hope things work out for the best for you, I'm Done, whether that means divorce or reconciliation. Our marriage counselor suggested a book that my husband and I are currently reading a book called "The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work". We are not yet finished with the book, but I do think it has some good tools for helping to repair a marriage. Good luck to you!!!!
I've completely shocked myself for falling for a married man.Cheating is against everything I believe in but I believe it's happening.
My co-worker started picking me up for breaks and then I started doing the same for him. He's married, I'm not.
I always believed we were just friends and then I started having feelings for him. I told myself that as long as I didn't step over the boundries, I was ok.
Only now,he's the one that's pushing the line. Last week he left candy and a personal massager on my wildshield.
What to do, I'm not sure. I want to keep our friendship, but not sure it's right. I won't have sex with him and he knows that but at the same time I think what he is doing is wrong b/c he's married.It shouldn't matter if the marriage is good or not. My motto is to clean up the mess you made befor making another.
I have been having an emotional affair also, it really pains me that this ever happened. I did not think I would EVER do this. I have been very naive and childish when it comes to this man. I haven't been married for very long, a little less than 5 years and I have two children with my husband. I came clean just days after it started, and I cannot seem to stop thinking of this man. He keeps me awake, and I can't even count how many times I have tried to stay away from him(both physically and via the internet), and failed. My husband and I are getting counseling but I just feel empty now...I really do not want to hurt my husband and I really do love him. I want to keep my family intact, and then again I can't stop thinking about this man. Most days I would rather not choose. I don't know if I can get over this, I really is it hadn't happened at all, and that I had been a strong and faithful wife. I let everyone down including myself, and I it is a very embarrassing situation. Especially because this man really doesn't want to ruin my marriage, and seems so noble. I want to be free of him, really free of him.
What a disgusting way to tell people to deal with this devastating issue....the cheater is insecure and dishonest...not the victim...POS A-hole writer....
I can see making yourself more attractive...to other people...but not for a self-centered cheat.
My husband ended an EA with a coworker about 7 months ago. Not sure how long it went on. I had never heard of this woman before about a year ago, but found out he has know this "friend" for years and gave her the job that brought her to his office and closer to him. He says he did this because she is so good at her job...I'll just bet she is. This is one of many emotional affairs in our relationship. I don't know why he keeps doing this...and at this point I truly do not care. He says he is changed now and will never do it again..but I think he is saying that because I am on my way out the door. I want him to get couseling, but not for me or the marriage; that ship has sailed. I want him to figure out why he keeps doing this so he can have a better life for himself and his next wife. (Been there, done that on marriage counseling...it just didn't take for him apparently.)
Anyway, I do feel inadequate. I think he enjoys me feeling that way. I am pretty (other people tell me that anyway) and smart. I am just not those things to him. What makes me most sad is that I now feel I have wasted my youth on him...we have been together 25 years total. He never appreciated me or what we had. That is so clear now. I cannot forgive him this time...I just am not that good a person.
You should be ASHAMED of yourself to telling people they should make THEMSELVES more attractive! I just found out yesterday that my husband of 15 years with whom we have two kids, has been having an emotional affair with a woman he works with for months. I am devastated and he has ruined the lives of our children now because I will never be able to get over this and will proceed with divorce.
I am a VERY attractive woman both physically and on the inside and let me tell you, that has NOTHING to do with it. He feels that he has more in common with her than with me and says he has been unhappy for years little known to me. So don't tell ME that I need to do something to make myself more attractive! Tell my daughter and my son that there mom wasn't "attractive" enough for daddy and he couldn't resist...I hope and pray NO ONE listens to your HARMFUL advice !!!!!!!
I don't mean to play devil's advocate here, but the author wrote " make yourself more WANTED". Making yourself more attractive was not written. I think it is a misconception that men have affairs because their wife isn't as physically attractive as the other woman/women. This is not true. It can happen to anyone.
I believe that with emotional affairs the attraction is more of a bond than a sexual " thing " ..at least at first it is. Maybe the author is trying to say that one way to fix it is to improve the bonds that are lacking in the marriage..the bonds other than sexual bonds...but including them also.
My question is this: What if your spouse is more invested emotionally with another family member or friend that with you ? Of course I'm not implying any sexual desire, but you know that the other person's needs will ALWAYS come before your own. What kind of "affair" does that make ?
Wow, make yourself more attractive....
I had to laugh when I read that gobbledy gook...it soud like it was a suggestion for a wife to run out to Frederick's and get some sexy lingerie...
I am a man, been through an EA from 1992 with resolved issues that still burn deep in me. I stayed because of a child with a chronic illness, now 23 and living on thier own.
About three years ago, the burn turned to rage when I though how disrespectfully I was treated. The man was working on our house, adding an addition and pelacing a garage. all the time I thought he was doing his job, he and my wife were doing the sit around the coffee table and talk about their lives.
She told him of her pain, pain of having a child with an illness, her unhappiness with her current life, and her failed relationships she had in the past. There were two men she really wanted...one ending up telling her she was like a sister to her but couldn't marry her, the other was one that wouldn't make a long term committment until he finished his resdiency. The latter did want to continue a physical relationship with her but she would have to wait for him to finish his residency until he would committ (4 years).
Me, I was the consistent one. I never strayed, I never was involved with anyone other than her...and never thought that she was keeping in touch with an old lover (and telling him how things were going with us...at one point in our relationship, she actually asked him if he "Needed a nurse in his life to take care of him") or having the contractor come by every day to fulfill her need to be wanted.
I was working two jobs at the time of the contractor...one full time, the other two hours a day during the winter to fulfill a dream I had to be a coach. i was home by 430 every day, picked up our child in day care and kept him entertained until his bed time at 8pm. She had the morning off, had the child in day care at 830am, and had the rest of the day until she went to work at 4 until 11pm. Little did i know that her hours were filled with running errands for the contractor, picking up things for him at the grocery store, or sitting around the coffee table chatting the hours away...
I came home during work one day early and found a "love card" he gave her sitting on the bureau...the front said "I love you and want you..." and confronted her about it. He professed is love and desire for her three months earlier and had been at the house constantly when I was at work or until she left.
We had a long talk about how I didnt fulfill her needs, how I was always gone, how he made her feel alive, how attractive he was, how turned on she was by him...the signs came rushing in...she was more interactive in bed with me...she was working out more, trying to lose some extra weight...she started to jump up and answer the phone when I was there, she asked when I was leaving...
One night, he was at the house to sign a contract for more work (I didnt know that there was something going on...) she basically threw her breasts on to his shoulder to look at the contract. That night she wore a low cut top with plenty of exposure...tight pants that she was able to fit into....then proceeded to have passionate sex with me after he left.
I can never get the images out of my mind of what I saw and the comments that were made by both of them to me...her deep desire for him, his statements that she has never felt good with me, that I was never the one she really wanted, how I never made her happy.
About a month after I found his card to her, I was cleaning out the attic when I found a box full of cards and letters she kept. Many were from the contractor (I sheepishly admit I read them). There was a deep emotional tie between the two of them, one that was turning towards a physical relationship. He asked her to leave me, to divorce me, and he would adopt our son and be his father.
In addition, I found some letters from the med student she had a relationship with from years past. One basically asked him to marry her (this was while were were discussing our own marriage plans)...he returned 6 months later and made a serious play for her but she wanted a commitment and he said he couldn't then but maybe in the future. I didnt know about this, I asked her to marry me about a week after he rejected her....
Do I feel used? I see this as a woman that wanted someone else (when we were dating), ending up settling for me, then fell in love (she admittied she was in love with the contractor) while I was doing everything a husband and father should.
It still haunts me....18 years after the contractor, 26 years after the med student...30 years after being with her either serious dating or married. I do love her but have such deep resentment at being the "settled on one" or the "man she never respected" (comment from the contractor)...
Emotional affairs and lost loves that come back can be far more damaging, have longer impact, and devastate the victim more than a casual physical relationship can. Unless the physical relationship grows deeper in to a psychological and sexual affair that ends in divorce, the victim has to deal with a multitude of self-doubt, distrust, rejection, and paranoia that it might happen again.
Been there, done that....and still reeling from it after all these years.
maynard 2 years ago
what? the best way to deal with an emotional affair is to make yourself more wanted??? thats like blaming yourself!