Blog #4: How could you do this to me? Emotional and Physical Betrayals of Infidelity
Affair, adultery, cheating, stepping outside of the marriage, betrayal, and being unfaithful are all terms often associated with infidelity in committed relationships. For married couples, adultery is generally understood to be engaging in sex with someone who is not your spouse. But for many couples infidelity includes acts which are inconsistent with the agreed upon rules and expectations of the marital or other relationship agreement. So even behaviors and relationships that do not involve sexual intercourse may also be considered acts of infidelity–especially in the cyber age.
One woman stated, “I only stepped outside of the marriage when you said you were done and filing for divorce–so technically that’s not cheating!” The problem was that her husband didn’t see it that way. In his mind, while he might have been considering a divorce and they may have been living separately, he still assumed the marital vows of fidelity were in tact. She, on the other hand, assumed otherwise causing an even greater rift in the relationship.
For our purposes, if you believe that you or your spouse has violated your relationship agreement we consider that infidelity. The act or activity in which a partner engages in, while meaningful, is not what determines whether you feel betrayed by or have betrayed your partner. While there is not great scientific data on how couples view unfaithful behavior some national polls provide insight. The Huffington Post (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/21/what-is-cheating_n_4638945.html) found that 82% of men and 56% of women considered sexting a form of cheating, while 90% of women and 75% of men consider passionately kissing being unfaithful. So clearly there seems to be some consensus that sexually-oriented or sexually arousing behavior with someone outside a marriage or sexually exclusive partnership is considered a betrayal of the relationship contract (for clarity the term marriage/marital/spouse will be used to encompass other mutually agreed upon, sexually exclusive relationships, such as those common among cohabiting couples).
While the engagement in sexual activities outside a marriage is generally more easily identified as a form of infidelity, “emotional affairs” are often more difficult to pin down. For our purposes we will use the definition provided by WebMD where an emotional affair is defined as a relationship “…between two people that mimics the closeness and emotional intimacy of an affair while never being physically consummated” (http://www.webmd.com/sex-relationships/features/emotional-cheating-guilty). Emotional affairs can often start as friendships between neighbors, work colleagues, associates, and involve a degree of closeness, personal intimacy, and connectedness that often meets or exceeds that of the marital relationship.
Recently a male client told me that he was in the dog house with his wife for texting another woman. The texts were not in any way sexual, but they were flirty and had obviously created an emotional connection between himself and the woman. This gentleman had been deleting message threads, indicating that while he could rationalize that he wasn’t having a sexual affair, he was definitely trying to hide something from his wife. The constancy, the emotion, and the secrecy of these texts felt like an absolute betrayal to his wife.
Emotional affairs actually can be much more devastating to a partner than when an affair is simply a sexual encounter. Emotional affairs create an attachment that is not easily broken. This can complicate the healing process after an affair. Secondly, in emotional affairs many secrets and marital struggles are shared with someone outside the marriage–someone who is specifically a threat to the marriage itself. Finally, with emotional affairs, it is likely only a matter of time until sexual interactions occur. WebMD provides an excellent checklist to see if you or your spouse may be involved in an emotional affair: http://www.webmd.com/sex-relationships/features/emotional-cheating-guilty
The goal of HTH is to help couples heal from “betrayals” associated with infidelity. I believe that regardless of the type and forum for an extra-marital relationship, whether it be sexual, emotional, cyber/online, and sexting, that this constitutes infidelity. The information, tips, and stories that we will share are intended to assist couples who have broken/lost trust in their relationship due to one or both partners’ involvement with someone outside the marriage. So as I said at the beginning, if it feels like “infidelity” to you, then it is–whether sex was involved or not. If trust has been broken, then healing needs to occur and that is what we will help you do!
DISCLAIMER: Throughout the blog I will be sharing stories to illustrate points and bring understanding to different aspects of infidelity. Client confidentiality is of utmost importance to me. For that reason, I have changed many details, brought in stories of friends and acquaintances, AND combined more than one account to make a composite experience. Many stories of infidelity and the experience surrounding it are very similar from person to person, but no one story used in this blog can be attributed solely to a single client.