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I’ve been a marriage and family counselor for more than 40 years. Most people I counsel want a loving, committed relationship that lasts through time. But too many have suffered from betrayal from a partner they thought they could trust. Here’s the thing, most partners don’t intend to betray their lover. We think of betrayal as being sexual. One person has an affair, keeps it secret, but then gets caught and the relationship is thrown into turmoil and often ends.
Dr. John Gottman may be the most important researcher in the world on what makes relationships work and what undermines them. In his book What Makes Love Last? How to Build Trust and Avoid Betrayal he describes common betrayals that often go unnoticed until, seemingly out of the blue, the sh*t hits the fan. Gottman reminds us that
“a committed relationship is a contract of mutual trust, respect, nurturance, and protection. Anything that violates that contract can become traitorous.”
As more men and women spent time in the larger world beyond the home, there are greater opportunities for joy, but also greater opportunities to slip from a friendship or collegial relationship into an emotional affair. The line between innocent connection and betrayal may not be clear until it’s too late.
Like many professionals, I attend conferences three or four times a year where I interact with colleagues and learn the latest information in my field of gender medicine and men’s health. At one conference I met a woman. We had a lot in common professionally, and we learned that both our fathers had suffered from depression and bipolar disorder. We did similar kinds of work in our therapy practice. In other words, we had a lot in common, both personally and professionally. We spent a lot of time during the conference talking and sharing experiences. I felt I had found a long-lost friend and looked forward to seeing her again.
When I got home I told my wife about meeting Brenda. At first, she seemed mildly interested, but as I talked more she became increasingly uncomfortable. She became suspicious about what had happened. I kept insisting that “nothing had happened.” In my mind, a betrayal involved something sexual. Although Brenda was certainly attractive, I kept the boundary clear and “nothing had happened.” But my wife wasn’t suspecting that we’d jumped into bed together. She was feeling the possibility of an emotional affair.
It took us a long time to work through our perceptions and fears. I wish I had the benefit of a recent book by marriage therapist Sheri Meyers, Chatting or Cheating: How to Detect Infidelity, Rebuild Love, and Affair-Proof Your Relationship.
She helps answer these critically important questions:
- When does a friendship become more than a simple friendship?
- When does an innocent acquaintance turn into something extra?
- When does a relatively platonic situation evolve into a deeper connection?
- How do you know if there is someone else?
- How do you know if your partner has crossed the line?
If my wife and I had read Meyers’ book, we would have better understood that becoming intimately involved emotionally with someone can be as much a betrayal as becoming sexually involved with them. She makes this clear as she describes “emotional sex” and offers the following descriptions:
- Emotional Sex is the unspoken attraction, the deeply rooted need to bond, attach, and feel loved that can turn a friendship into an affair.
- Emotional Sex is an affair of the heart that feels the same as romantic love and can manifest itself in numerous ways—physically, chemically, romantically, emotionally, lustfully, verbally, even in cyberspace through texts, emails, and video chats.
- Emotional Sex happens when you feel that someone else gives you what you are missing in your primary relationship, and because of this, you channel the bulk of your emotions, hopes and desires onto the other person.
The key to recognizing the early signs of a developing emotional affair is when we begin comparing the other person with our primary partner and finding that our primary partner falls short. Subtly at first, we begin looking for the emotional connection that we are missing in our primary relationship in our “new friend.”
Luckily in my case, my wife picked up on the potential danger earlier than I did. Of course, I felt confident enough in our relationship to tell her about meeting Brenda at the conference. Often the flames of emotional affairs are fanned by deception. We tell ourselves,
“Nothing happened so it’s not worth telling my spouse about. She/he’ll just became needlessly jealous and grill me every time I go to a conference. Besides, we all deserve to have our own friends, don’t we?”
Here are some of the behaviors described by Sheri Meyers that may indicate an emotional affair:
- Flirts with others (i.e. sends signals that they are romantically available or interested).
- Discusses confidential things about our relationship with a member of the opposite sex.
- Shares their most private thoughts and feelings with someone else and not me.
- Discusses sexual desires and fantasies with someone other than me.
- Regularly exchanges personal emails or text messages with a friend or ex-partner.
- Purchases intimate gifts for others whom I don’t know about.
- Develops a crush or feelings for someone else, even if not acted upon.
These, and other behaviors, can be signs that an emotional affair is developing. All violate that circle of intimacy and safety that surrounds a healthy partnership. Everyone has their own boundaries and needs. We’ve all been hurt by violations of trust from past relationships. The key to a successful relationship is to develop trust early on, to talk about the areas that may be sources of betrayal, and to continue to keep current with our partner as our needs for intimacy and our vulnerabilities change through time.
I look forward to hearing about your own experiences. If you, or your partner, are having difficulties in these areas, I offer support and counseling to help you to prevent an affair before it occurs or to heal from one if it has occurred. You can contact me through my website, www.MenAlive.com.
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An emotional affair is more painful. It undermines the relationship, and makes the other spouse a third wheel.Going through it right now (he is having it, not me) and it is killing me. He complains to her about me, not even discussing things with me & I am beyond uncomfortable around her. I know I should not care what she thinks, but…..He *will not discuss her with me*
Thank you for this article! Emotional affair destroyed my marriage 9 years ago. Although my than husband didn’t sleep with her, they became emotionally close while we were going through difficult period in our marriage. I always felt he cheated on me by being too close with her. We ended up getting divorced, and he’s now married to her. I wish I would have read your article back then – maybe it would save our marriage.
Wow, so sorry to hear that you went through this. I am now too. Any advice on how to stop it if they won’t? I can’t even discuss it with my husband. I hope you have found some one now too.
I tried to click on your link and gets a message that your website is unavailable.
“Shares their most PRIVATE thoughts and feelings with someone else and not me.”
Sounds like a lot the status of relationships between kids and their parents. Parents complain that they don’t know anything about their kids; however, you asks kids about what they know about their parents, and the kids will say that they don’t know anything about their parents. It is kind of like where police officers share their lives with each other but don’t do it with their own family members.
Also (yeah this really has me angry), would the author (who I invite to respond) have it that if you are bisexual and married that you can have no emotional intimacy of any kind outside your marriage? Many layered intimacies are the sign of an emotionally mature human being with a fully functioning heart. I would consider a spousal insistence that any relationship that *could* lead to an emotional affair a serious warning sign that your partner would prefer not to grow at all emotionally in this one shot we have on earth. The warning signs the author and his… Read more »
This line of thinking (aside from being absurdly heteronormative) is utterly ridiculous. It seems that the author believes that nothing other than a “simple friendships” can coexist in a marriage. And that he was “lucky” his wife saw the warning signs.
We human beings are social animals. We seek intimacy and connection. The author’s monogamous commitment seems to outlaw the most beautiful and enduring lifelong connections. How sad.
Thank you for this wise article. You ask for our feed-back. In a childless marriage for 34 years, I’ve honestly never come anywhere near infidelity. But now I am wondering whether I should go looking. My wife has come out to herself and to me as a lesbian, and our low-sex marriage has become a no-sex one. She’s not looking for a lover, after her long years of struggle with her same-sex attractions, she’s asexual. But I’m now wondering whether I don’t need to look on the internet for a woman in a mirror relationship: happily married to a gay… Read more »
Hi, Dr. Diamond! Great article. I think modern situations do lead to near-endless opportunities for emotional affairs. I’ve seen articles and research which suggest that women are much more sensitive to their men’s having emotional bonds with other women, whereas men seem more concerned with sexual fidelity and will get into dangerous territory with women outside their relationship, thinking it’s fine because “nothing happened”. I have a weird situation which I wonder if you’d comment on. My partner is a “naturalist” and likes to go to the nude beach. We have had endless problems because of it. I find it… Read more »
Manda, Many couples run into situations where there is an impasse. She says “no” and he says “yes.” Often getting unstuck starts with really being open to understand our partner’s feelings and needs. It would be interesting to hear from him about what he’s needing. Is going to the beach an expression of freedom? Does he have a need to see naked women and be seen by them? Rather than seeing his behavior as wrong, really trying to understand what its about for him might lead to some new openings to resolve the impasse. Sometimes a good counselor can help… Read more »