TalesoftheWireMonkey Posted April 25, 2014 Share Posted April 25, 2014 I want to ask and discuss a basic question: What differentiates an emotional affair from a close friendship? Link to post Share on other sites
Author TalesoftheWireMonkey Posted April 25, 2014 Author Share Posted April 25, 2014 Now that I've posted I see some old threads on this question in the similar threads section. Funny those didn't show up when I searched it? I disqualify relationships that incorporate phone sex, sexting, erotic flirting. I'd say in those instances it's moved on to something stronger. Link to post Share on other sites
cocorico Posted April 25, 2014 Share Posted April 25, 2014 I want to ask and discuss a basic question: What differentiates an emotional affair from a close friendship? How insecure your friend's partner is. 2 Link to post Share on other sites
janedoe67 Posted April 25, 2014 Share Posted April 25, 2014 Here are some good questions to ask: Do I share personal details of my primary relationship with this friend? Do I keep any facet of my friendship secret from my partner? Do I look forward to any interaction with my friend as a way to feel good or attractive? Do I find myself negatively comparing my partner with my friend? Do I know that I feel attraction and chemistry with my friend? If one answers ANY of the above questions yes, then one should be extremely careful 9 Link to post Share on other sites
iiiii Posted April 25, 2014 Share Posted April 25, 2014 Do I keep any facet of my friendship secret from my partner? This is the key for me. If you would be unwilling for your partner to know everything you have talked about and/or done with your friend, then it's no longer a friendship, but an emotional affair. 3 Link to post Share on other sites
d0nnivain Posted April 25, 2014 Share Posted April 25, 2014 Friendships are important. Emotional affairs cross boundaries when they are usurping the connection with your SO. For some the gender of the other person can play a role. It's rare than people complain that their partner is confiding too much in a same sex friend. Link to post Share on other sites
MissBee Posted April 25, 2014 Share Posted April 25, 2014 The same thing that differentiates platonic friendship from a relationship... romantic interest and the level of emotional intimacy. It's all about boundaries though and having proper ones. If you are using someone (esp of the gender you're attracted to) emotionally in the same way you would use your SO...it has crossed the line. Relationships are relationships because there are things there only for the couple and that foster a strong connection that bonds them....and no it's not only about sex. How I treat my boyfriend, the kinds of things we talk about and how we build emotional intimacy is different than with friends and once I start doing that with another man I'm taking away from my relationship and also opening the door for things to move from emotional to physical. If you have a friendship that you're worried about it's probably because your boundaries are off. Everyone feels within themselves when they're entertaining a friendship that has been set up to easily cross the line. 1 Link to post Share on other sites
BHsigh Posted April 25, 2014 Share Posted April 25, 2014 Do I keep any facet of my friendship secret from my partner? This right here is the answer, if you can say or do it in front of your partner then it isn't cheating, if you have to hide it, then it is. It has nothing to do whatsoever with how insecure your friends partner is, that is an issue that they will need to work out in their relationship, and if the other isn't happy with it, then they are free to leave, not sneak around. 2 Link to post Share on other sites
janedoe67 Posted April 25, 2014 Share Posted April 25, 2014 Here's another one: is yes, I forfeit my right to opposite sex friendships where either of us are not morally available. Link to post Share on other sites
dichotomy Posted April 25, 2014 Share Posted April 25, 2014 This right here is the answer, if you can say or do it in front of your partner then it isn't cheating, if you have to hide it, then it is. It has nothing to do whatsoever with how insecure your friends partner is, that is an issue that they will need to work out in their relationship, and if the other isn't happy with it, then they are free to leave, not sneak around. yes this - no hiding anything. If you can imagine your partner being able to hear or see everything that happens between you an close opposite sex friend - and being ok with what they would see or hear - then it is not an EA. Cheating (an affair) is basically giving something (emotion, sex, private information, money, even special time) to an opposite sex person that your partner would consider was exclusive between only you and them. Sex is usually pretty clear - but many couples don't really sit down and express what they would consider cheating or betrayal. People differ. Link to post Share on other sites
anne1707 Posted April 25, 2014 Share Posted April 25, 2014 How insecure your friend's partner is. Utter rubbish. The partner could be incredibly trusting and feel very secure whilst the EA is going on. However when they find out about the EA, most people would then understand them feeling insecure. Note: I say "most" because there are some on here who just don't get that the BS is human and has a right to feel displeasure at their partner having an affair. 6 Link to post Share on other sites
TheGuard13 Posted April 25, 2014 Share Posted April 25, 2014 Wait, so if I'm totally willing to tell my girlfriend I banged another girl, it's not cheating? A loophole emerges! 1 Link to post Share on other sites
whichwayisup Posted April 25, 2014 Share Posted April 25, 2014 I want to ask and discuss a basic question: What differentiates an emotional affair from a close friendship? Close friendship - Knowing your boundaries, respecting spouses and lines are never crossed. A genuine UNSELFISH care for the friend. Spouses are included in the friendship as well, no lies, no secrets, no betrayals. Emotional affair - Where others will be hurt by the friendship. EA is selfish and self serving, excluding spouses (most of the time) and does damages to marriages and relationships. Link to post Share on other sites
d0nnivain Posted April 25, 2014 Share Posted April 25, 2014 Here's another one: is yes, I forfeit my right to opposite sex friendships where either of us are not morally available. No. You can still have opposite sex friends. You just can't invest all of your emotions into that friendship while not giving emotional attention to your SO. When the friendship outweighs the relationship it's a problem. Wait, so if I'm totally willing to tell my girlfriend I banged another girl, it's not cheating? No. We're talking about doing anything behind the other person's back without their upfront permission. If you have an open relationship & no commitment to be exclusive you can have sex with all sorts of people. It's when you hide stuff that's it's a problem. Link to post Share on other sites
BHsigh Posted April 25, 2014 Share Posted April 25, 2014 Wait, so if I'm totally willing to tell my girlfriend I banged another girl, it's not cheating? A loophole emerges! If you tell her beforehand and she says ok, then no, it's not cheating. Link to post Share on other sites
notserene Posted April 25, 2014 Share Posted April 25, 2014 Wait, so if I'm totally willing to tell my girlfriend I banged another girl, it's not cheating? A loophole emerges! That would be a case where it is far, far better to ask permission than forgiveness. Link to post Share on other sites
OpenBook Posted April 25, 2014 Share Posted April 25, 2014 So a married person has to RECEIVE PERMISSION from their spouse to nurture a friendship???? Their spouse becomes the Gatekeeper to all their other relationships?? That's a parental role... or a prison guard. What a wretched existence. <<<OpenBook shudders>>> SO glad I'm not married!!! 1 Link to post Share on other sites
anne1707 Posted April 25, 2014 Share Posted April 25, 2014 So a married person has to RECEIVE PERMISSION from their spouse to nurture a friendship???? Their spouse becomes the Gatekeeper to all their other relationships?? That's a parental role... or a prison guard. What a wretched existence. <<<OpenBook shudders>>> SO glad I'm not married!!! No. Not what has been said at all. It's not about seeking permission. The issue is whether it is deliberately hidden from the spouse. Link to post Share on other sites
BHsigh Posted April 26, 2014 Share Posted April 26, 2014 So a married person has to RECEIVE PERMISSION from their spouse to nurture a friendship???? Their spouse becomes the Gatekeeper to all their other relationships?? That's a parental role... or a prison guard. What a wretched existence. <<<OpenBook shudders>>> SO glad I'm not married!!! No one has said that at all, what had mainly been said was that anything to do with a friend that has to be hidden from your SO is cheating. If you won't do it in front of them, then don't do it. We're talking about using basic common sense here, not asking for permission for everything. 1 Link to post Share on other sites
Author TalesoftheWireMonkey Posted April 26, 2014 Author Share Posted April 26, 2014 After 30 or so years of being a single man who often than not works closely with married women I've had literally dozens that get into deep personal, emotional conversations with me many even reveal intimate details of their life. They all say the same thing, "I can talk to you in a way that I can't with my spouse. I can tell you things I never tell him. " Despite all of that I never felt like I was having an affair because at the end of the day I was never the one they were going to bed with. Around where I come from women don't tend to marry men they can talk to. They marry hard-working, dependable, physical men of few words. Men who don't have much to say but are financially dependable and share their core values. Farmers, builders, mechanics. Men who could tune their car or fix the plumbing without blinking an eye or add a room onto the house by themselves. I think the women would be just as shocked as me if you said we were having emotional affairs. These women don't talk to their husbands they never expected to. The husbands do provide physical intimacy and financial security. I sometimes wonder if people have too high an expectation of what a relationship can provide? 2 Link to post Share on other sites
underwater2010 Posted April 26, 2014 Share Posted April 26, 2014 Future faking, ILYs and pics/videos. Hiding the friendship/relationship from your spouse/significant other. I always say that if you cannot say it in front of your SO, then it is not right. If it is an action that you would not do in front of your SO, then it is not right. If it is a behavior/friendship that you wouldn't want your SO to have, then it is not right. If it makes your SO uncomfortable, then it is time to drop the friendship or let your SO go. Link to post Share on other sites
bene Posted April 26, 2014 Share Posted April 26, 2014 Friendships don't have sexual tension between people. Emotional affair for me includes some sexual spark, "what if..." thinking and gestures that are not common between friends. Just that you haven't actually had sex with someone yet doesn't mean that the relationship is purely platonic. When people interact with a friend, then figuratively speaking their SO could walk in any time and it wouldn't be awkward and they wouldn't witness something that can be interpreted as more than friends. If you do something with a friend that you need to hide from your SO (assuming that they are not unhealthily paranoid or possessive) then it is not that innocent anymore. 1 Link to post Share on other sites
purplesorrow Posted April 26, 2014 Share Posted April 26, 2014 After 30 or so years of being a single man who often than not works closely with married women I've had literally dozens that get into deep personal, emotional conversations with me many even reveal intimate details of their life. They all say the same thing, "I can talk to you in a way that I can't with my spouse. I can tell you things I never tell him. " Despite all of that I never felt like I was having an affair because at the end of the day I was never the one they were going to bed with. Around where I come from women don't tend to marry men they can talk to. They marry hard-working, dependable, physical men of few words. Men who don't have much to say but are financially dependable and share their core values. Farmers, builders, mechanics. Men who could tune their car or fix the plumbing without blinking an eye or add a room onto the house by themselves. I think the women would be just as shocked as me if you said we were having emotional affairs. These women don't talk to their husbands they never expected to. The husbands do provide physical intimacy and financial security. I sometimes wonder if people have too high an expectation of what a relationship can provide? Would you and the women be willing to have the same conversations with their husbands? Link to post Share on other sites
notserene Posted April 26, 2014 Share Posted April 26, 2014 When I was a young student, I was in a study group with an older, male student. We would occasionally hang out and drink coffee after we were done with our work. Over time, he started talking to me about his wife. She was pregnant and he was stressed out about it because he was going to school, they didn't have much money, he wasn't sure if she had gotten pregnant accidentally-on-purpose, etc. I listened but I didn't have a lot to say about his wife. I later talked to another male friend about it (my best friend's long term boyfriend). He told me "That guy is interested in you. He wouldn't be talking about his wife like that if he wasn't." I don't know if I was being groomed for an affair or if the guy had just stepped over an emotional boundary without really thinking about it. After that, I stayed in the study group but I stopped going for coffee with the guy. A few months later, his wife had the baby and he was over the moon about his daughter. After that he was friendly but distant. I forgot about all of this until recently... Fast forward about twenty years and I have a husband who cheated on me with a woman who presumably offered him a listening ear about his marital stress (we had some money problems, I have one child who was displaying some difficult behavior). The affair is over, it was short, my husband is deeply remorseful, but my marriage is profoundly damaged. People can have friends of the opposite sex, but a person spending a lot of time alone with you confiding about their spouse or their family life should be a giant red flag to you. 1 Link to post Share on other sites
EasyHeart Posted April 26, 2014 Share Posted April 26, 2014 What differentiates an emotional affair from a close friendship?Sexual attraction. I would never bang my buddy Alan, even if he showed up nekkid at my front door. Link to post Share on other sites
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