Just a question for conversation:)

[Foreverwondering]

I am not asking this for advice or anything its just a question that came into my mind while wondering on these boards..

What do you people think causes people to risk their relationships with their SO's to start affairs with someone else? even if they feel that the person they are with (SO) are "The One" for them? is it the excitment of getting away with a taboo, is it for courosity of the unknown? i just wanted your ideas or thoughts about this, i guess everyones situtation is different but i just wanted some thoughts on this.

[Moose]

What do you people think causes people to risk their relationships with their SO's to start affairs with someone else?

There are many reasons. Some are valid, some aren't. Personally, I think affairs start when one or the other neglects their SO's needs. The communication slows or stops completley, leaving a void that needs filled. Eventually, the person seeks a fix.

[Mz. Pixie]

Moose is right on. It's something in the marital relationship that is not meeting the other persons needs.

 

For me, it was affection and attention. For others it's sex or something else.

[DazednConfused]

Oh yeah, the needs theory;

 

The common conception is that the cheating spouse has gone outside the marriage to have their “needs” met. I am one of those who bought into this theory and believed every word. I still think that in many, many cases, there is some validity to the concept.

 

What proponents of this theory fail to address is why nearly 90% of extramarital affairs are sexual.

 

I just don't believe that 90% of the adulterous relationships "need" is sex. The theory also does not address why go to the opposite sex for meeting those needs?

 

Example: Jack has a "need" for recreation. He likes to bowl. Judy, his wife, hates bowling. She constantly breaks nails and hates the idea of rental shoes.

 

Jack needs a different bowling companion.

 

Why is it that when presented with the choice between the chubby, balding neighbor who adores bowling and is near his skill level, and the attractive thirty-something housewife across the street, why does Jack w/o fail choose the housewife???????

 

The "need" or the "desire" simply created the conditions, adulterous people create the opportunity. Affairs require both.

 

"Needs" can be met in any number of ways, and none of them requires an adulterous relationship of any kind.

 

So why the risk as in the original post? Because there is never any intent to harm. Except in the case of a revenge affair, neither party enters the affair with the intent of hurting their spouse. In fact they fully expect the affair to run its course w/o their spouses ever the wiser.

 

That is the expectation, we all know the reality.

 

just my .02

 

-Dazed

[catb]

Being an unfaithful spouse and having lost all to an adulterous relationship i can tell you that it is usually done out of desperation. I was a coward. Instead of dealing with all the problems in my marriage i chose to FIX it all with someone else.(HA HA) At 43 being married for nearly 20 years-hell yeah someone comes along and listens to you and makes you feel beautiful and sexy again, its like a drug to an addict. WHEN YOU FEEL LIKE YOU HAVE NOTHING TO LOSE YOU DO DESPERATE THINGS.

[wanting to heal]

Cat, you said that you lost it all. Please define "it all".

 

So, it was a mistake? If so, when did you realize it, at the time or much later?

[MySugaree]

Many affairs begin at work with a good friend, opposite sex colleague.Things start innocently enough: trusted work buddies start talking about non-work issues involving spouses. Confidences are exchanged, emotional attachments form as the work relationship morphs slowly into something more. There's an attraction.

 

Then, at a holiday party or after-work happy hour, the two friends, their inhibitions reduced by alcohol, act on their mutual attraction. The lust/attraction hormones start flowing and, before you know it, the office lovebirds are boinking each other at every opportunity.

 

Affairs are not usually premeditated.The goal is not to hurt one's spouse or to destroy one's marriage. Yet both do happen. As for why, my best guess is that affairs happen because people, mainly due to unmet emotional needs, forget all about boundaries. Love and sex respect no boundaries. An affair is a sexual/emotional blizkrieg.

[Marshbear]

Affairs happen for many reasons. I think men/women can have an affair and still be in-love with their S/O. It is called "getting some strange". Sometimes the marriage gets dull or predictable and someone comes along , or they go looking, and they just feel with their loins and throw caution to the wind. It is exciting and like a drug. You feel guilty but the chance of getting caught just stimulates you all the more. I think sometimes you want to get caught just to see how your S/O responds. Does she/he really love me? Will they get jealous?

 

I also think affairs happen because you fall out of love or the relationship is so bad that you need someone outside to validate your existence. You are lonely, depressed, sad, can't talk to your S/O, and the spiral spins faster and faster until you think you will explode if you don't do something to feel better. These relationships can be more serious because you are looking for an emotional connection from someone other than your spouse. You can fall in love with your affair. You really don't care if your S/O finds out because you feel so good and you really want them to hurt, feel your pain. These tend to last for months or years and conclude with either you leaving your marriage or your S/O filing for divorce.

[StillHurtin]

My H's A started w/ a co-worker, they worked 2gether for about 3 years. My H's "excuse" for having an A was b/c I didn't pay attention to him like he wanted. I wonder why? After being called names all the time, and him being gone 6 nights a week out drinking w/ the guys tends to make a woman not want to pay attention to her H. He wanted the married life, wanted kids, but he didn't want to give up acting like a single guy. H did file for a D b4 he jumped into bed w/ the OW but he was having an emotional affair w/ her b4 he filed. H admitted what he did was wrong, and we should of tried MC b4 he decided to end our M and have an A.

[sylviaguardian]

There is also the 'have your cake and eat it' syndrome. Some people are fairly content and the marriage is going ok. The affair partner is just the icing on the cake. That way they get the stability and respect that comes from the long-term relationship and they also get all the fun of the 'dating' bit of it.

 

Syl

[sylviaguardian]

Originally posted by DazednConfused

Oh yeah, the needs theory;

 

The common conception is that the cheating spouse has gone outside the marriage to have their “needs” met. I am one of those who bought into this theory and believed every word. I still think that in many, many cases, there is some validity to the concept.

 

What proponents of this theory fail to address is why nearly 90% of extramarital affairs are sexual.

 

I just don't believe that 90% of the adulterous relationships "need" is sex. The theory also does not address why go to the opposite sex for meeting those needs?

 

Example: Jack has a "need" for recreation. He likes to bowl. Judy, his wife, hates bowling. She constantly breaks nails and hates the idea of rental shoes.

 

Jack needs a different bowling companion.

 

Why is it that when presented with the choice between the chubby, balding neighbor who adores bowling and is near his skill level, and the attractive thirty-something housewife across the street, why does Jack w/o fail choose the housewife???????

 

The "need" or the "desire" simply created the conditions, adulterous people create the opportunity. Affairs require both.

 

"Needs" can be met in any number of ways, and none of them requires an adulterous relationship of any kind.

 

So why the risk as in the original post? Because there is never any intent to harm. Except in the case of a revenge affair, neither party enters the affair with the intent of hurting their spouse. In fact they fully expect the affair to run its course w/o their spouses ever the wiser.

 

That is the expectation, we all know the reality.

 

just my .02

 

-Dazed

 

I totally agree with you Dazed. I am sick of hearing the 'unmet needs' theory, it's just so convenient. The truth is that once someone has had an affair, they have to find a way to 'justify' it so turning it back on the other person is a great option. If you read Shirley Glass's book called "Not just friends", she starts out on the first page by saying that 'Affairs happen in good marriages as well as bad'.

 

In my own case, I can see in retrospect that both my husband and I neglected our marriage due to the pressures of being a young working family. OK, I probably didn't meet his needs, he didn't meet mine either. The difference is that he made a personal choice to have an affair. Having an affair was simply not a choice for me, because my committment to him did not allow it to be an option.

 

So we could go along addressing all the needs that were not met in the marriage, but it still does not negate the fact that he chose to have a sexual relationship with someone else.

 

In addition, to further back up Dazed's post, affairs are not always about listening, supporting etc. Often they are about the buzz of having sex with someone else. End of story. My H told me afterwards that one of the reasons he got caught up with the OW was because she was simply a different person. So there's one need I could never meet - his need to have a relationship with a different person!

 

To me the umet needs thing is a cop out. It's just a way of 'justifying' something that the cheater does not want to take responsbility for (i.e. that they put their own selfish wants before staying loyal to someone who is loyal to them).

 

Sylvia

[shellys-trying]

I have read a few of your messages posted, Stillhurtin, and you sound sooooo much like me, it's uncanny!

 

You seem like a really nice person who just got crapped on. I hope you are doing better now. Are you still with H? Is OW still working where H does, if you are still with H?

 

My H worked around OW for about 6 months (after A ended)before she went to a different shift, which lasted for about 3 months and OW quit altogether. I had to watch my H go in everynight knowing he would see her, even if not talking to her. {note: One woman at work told H if she ever saw him talking to OW she would tell me and didn't care if H was her boss.} LOL

When he told OW it was over after telling me about the affair, she asked him, "are you sure?" and H told her he did love his wife and wanted it to work and he couldn't do that with OW still in the picture. She promised him she would leave him alone, but from sources at work (that I made friends with, who came to me because they had gone through similar situations with their husbands) had let me know she would stare at him all the time and one friend told me OW was heard in the bathroom wailing about how could she live without him (my husband).

 

Some weeks after the affair ended, I called her up and told her that it turned out, it (the affair) made my husband realize how important his marriage was and I told OW how he was alot better husband than before the affair. I actually thanked her and we hung up. She was all nice about it on the phone, but when she returned to work she started bothering H.

 

It was like, she wanted them to be friends since I was nice about it all after it was all said and done. By then, H was happy at home and we were getting closer, so H told her "no thanks, more or less, I don't wanna be friends, I just liked you to get some and that wasn't all that!"

 

That was when I confronted her face to face in a dept. store and we had a few words. She went to work and continued to bother H until he told her to leave him and his family alone. She even made out to H like she wanted to apologize to me for the affair and H fell for it (the idiot) and H called me at home from his work, with OW standing there, but when she got the phone, she started yelling at me and I could hear my husband in the back ground saying, "give me the Damn phone!" He knew she was a troublemaker. She hung up before he could get the phone and moments later H called me back telling me the lunatic b**** ran through the work cafateria yelling and ranting that if she got fired she would take him down with her!

 

You can imagine what I had to say to H. I had just hours before when he'd left for work told him to continue to avoid her and not talk to her and she'd eventually quit bothering him. He figured it out that she was a lunatic, got worried about his job and how he was to support his family if he got fired. I told him he hadn't worried about that for 3 months during his affair with her and it was good enough for him, but our kids would suffer for his stupidity. I had NO pity for H. I was fresh out. The pity well had run dry!

 

 

Anyway, if you ever want to email me privately and discuss our related "pasts" I wouldn't mind at all. Let me know. I'm just glad I found this place. It's like therapy, really!

 

Sincerely,

Shellys-trying

[phillygirl63]

I agree with most of the posts on why people have affairs. Looking back at my husband's affair it seems like he was turning 40, bored with his job, engulfed in activities that really only revolved around our kids, and felt I wasn't appreciative of him all that much (puh-leeze on this! Where was his appreciativeness of me?). I think he was bored and a younger, pretty woman at work paying him attention was a huge ego-booster.

 

Last night on tv, a marriage therapist said that he has found that when a wife starts an affair the marriage is in much worse shape than when a husband has an affair. It takes a lot more for a woman to cheat on her husband than vice versa apparently. I basically agree with that concept, except I think now the times are changing. I think more wives are cheating than ever before and I don't necessarily think there marriages are any worse off than the cheating men. What do you all thing?

[Mz. Pixie]

I know most of you are coming from the position of the BS, I'm trying to take that into consideration. I'm sorry for your pain.

 

I know without a doubt that my A started because of unmet needs. Unmet needs for years and years. Yes, I did make the choice ultimately to step out of the marriage- that was my choice, and I'm accepting responsibility for that. In my case though I'd tried to get my husband to go to counseling, read articles, and everything- over and over again. He'd promise he would do better and then two weeks later we'd be back to the same thing.

 

Unless you've ever been in my position you could never know what I went through before I cheated. I point blank told him that I was vulnerable for an affair or that I would end up divorcing him unless he worked on our marriage. That should have been a wake up call for him but it wasn't.

 

An affair is addictive. It's like not having food for days and days and then someone putting a prime rib in front of you. It sure would be hard not to eat that prime rib wouldn't it- especially when you were so hungry.

 

As far as why the sex ends up being part of the affair. I think that happens sometimes because the other person wants to keep that rush going. My A was not about "getting some strange". It was about that this person did and said things that I needed to hear that my exh never did.

 

That being said, if affairs weren't caused by unmet needs there would not be a need for the book "His Needs, Her Needs how to Affair Proof your Marriage" that has sold millions of copies!

[whichwayisup]

The thing is...One makes the effort...Then stops....Try to fix it...Works for abit...Then stops....Marriage is slowing collasping...WHY then not just END the marriage? It's not working? Instead, an affair is started...So now, there's the comfort of knowing LIFE is not great at home, still married though, still have a family...BUT, there is somebody else making you HAPPY...Life is good again.

 

That's called having the cake and eating it too.

 

If one isn't happy in the marriage and it's not working - GET OUT - Start over.

 

Problem is? Noone wants to deal with that change...Living alone, coping alone and dealing with all that goes on after splitting up....So yeah, staying is easier to live with because nothing changes. No consquences.

[Mz. Pixie]

Well, I did leave- that was actually the final straw. I knew if I had stooped to having a affair, I was desperately unhappy.

 

It was very tough. I had to turn my back on everything I'd had for 18 years. It is still tough sometimes, but getting easier!

[shellys-trying]

Your H sounds like mine. He was into OW cause she didn't want to go out and go places and of course their work was in common. He stopped by her house on the way to work, during weekend overtime, and then would spend an hour or so there and go on to work. Most usually he would go to her house (right on the way, no out of the way mileage I could catch) when she didn't have to work weekends, so he was slick at times. He even admitted after the A came out, that she could have transferred to a different shift but let the opportunity pass cause she wanted to stay on the shift he was to be near him.

 

When the A ended tho', especially in her OWN mind when she saw it was over, she moved on to that other shift, which lasted about 3 months and she quit altogether cause she dated and moved in with someone on that shift, he kicked her out and she was forced to quit because by then she had exhausted her supply of the men (mm & sm) in the workplace.

 

Yeah, I understand about him being unappreciated. I appreciated my H out the wahzoo! I was a real hubby bragger. He could do anything! He sure could, including cheating! (sarcastic snort!) I was always an advocate for my H. I loved him. Period. I got no appreciation none!

 

I'm not quite so gushy now. I did that all the years until he cheated. Now, he gets to step up and gush. I feel I've earned it. 4 kids (one after the A ended).

 

Yeah, somewhere like this has helped ME personally and this is only my third day.

There's been one or 2 comments that I've felt rankled about, but you know what, I haven't always had nice things to say about H myself since the A, so I read and learn and go on.

 

You did make some good points about men BTW.

[phillygirl63]

Mz Pixie, sounds like you were really in a sad situation and kind of validates what the marriage therapist said last night on tv - women are usually in a much worse state of marriage when they choose to have an affair than the men are (guess men are happy with the wife and the little honey on the side!). Anyway, sounds like you are doing well and I congratulate you on realizing that it was better to just get out of an unhappy situation than to sneak around and lie. Good Luck!

[Mz. Pixie]

Thanks Philly!

 

It would have been easier to stay actually than to take all the abuse I've taken (my a was even in the paper!) but I've managed to stay happy despite it all. I know I made the right decision for me!

[DazednConfused]

Generalization:

 

Last night on tv, a marriage therapist said that he has found that when a wife starts an affair the marriage is in much worse shape than when a husband has an affair. It takes a lot more for a woman to cheat on her husband than vice versa apparently.

 

Sometimes it takes very little for people of either sex to have an affair. Some people of both gender simply are too strong to have an affair and can reject temptation.

 

That being said, if affairs weren't caused by unmet needs there would not be a need for the book "His Needs, Her Needs how to Affair Proof your Marriage" that has sold millions of copies!

 

Agreed. That book has sold millions of copies. I have painstakingly read the whole thing more than a couple of times. When you get down to it though, not all rules apply to all people all the time except the rules of common decency, and even those are open to interpretation. While I believe Dr. Harley makes many many valid points in that book as well as the others he has written on the subject (And I have read all of them), he has fallen into the trap of "cookie-cutter" psychology. His theory is not the be-all, end-all authority.

 

One that I think most everyone will agree on is that a promise, vow, or oath is binding for the person whom is taking such a step as marriage. So, with that in mind, what makes it okay to go outside the marriage instead of either ending it or putting that energy into it?

 

So now we understand why a married person should not screw around, let's address the OP. When did it become okay to jump on another woman's husband? What in the world makes the rationale that it is okay to boink another man's wife?

 

I realize neither person usually has the intent to cause the damage that they do in their wake. I also realize that few affairs (except in the case of serial adulterers) are premeditated. But for everyone involved in an extramarital affair there has to come that moment of no return. That point where they gave in and went along for the ride instead of heeding their guilty conscience. I agree that there may have been circumstances within the marriage that weakened the defenses, but that point of no return was the real test that many people including myself have passed while others do not.

 

At the point of no return there are such things as rationalizations.

 

It's like not having food for days and days and then someone putting a prime rib in front of you. It sure would be hard not to eat that prime rib wouldn't it- especially when you were so hungry.

 

 

Maybe it's just me, but poison prime rib just doesn't make me get all warm and fuzzy inside.

 

Pixie, I gotta give you some props in that you did go to your husband first in an effort to get your steak at home. From your story, you made every effort. I am impressed as many of us Betrayed spouses would have given our left arms for just such the opportunity you gave your husband. Kudos.

 

At the same time, when it was clear that the marriage was not going to improve for you; wouldn't it have made more sense to cut the cord rather than cause yourself the backlash that always accompanies an extramarital affair? Please, I am not coming down on you at all, I am looking for the real truth w/o all the rationalizations I have heard time and time again.

 

Here's what it sounds like between the lines of your post:

 

"I knew I was never going to get from my husband and another man came along who was willing. It felt good (besides the guilt) to be liked and appreciated. Once it started to get a little old, we stepped it up to sexual to keep that buzz of new love going."

 

See... that makes sense to me. I can appreciate that you did try with your husband. But you owed it to yourself if nobody else to end that relationship and cut both of you loose before proceeding. If the new guy was that into you, he would have waited and been glad to do so.

 

<stepping down off soapbox now, waiting for flames>

 

-Dazed

[MySugaree]

The debate continues: one person's explanation is another's excuse. On one side are the Players--folks who are having, or had, an affair. Players seek not so much forgiveness as understanding. Affairs don't happen in a vacuum, and players attempt--with varying degrees of success--to place their affairs in context.

 

On the other side sit the Judgers. To Judgers, all explanations are attempted rationalizations. The world, to Judgers, is populated by two types: people of strong character who have the discipline, fortitude and moral backbone to resist temptation; and people of weak character, who possess no fortitude and who are morally spineless.

 

The twain never meet. Players and Judgers talk past each other on these boards. Even when discussion is polite, there's never any meeting of the mind.

 

What am I? I'm a Player, divorcing and living alone. My marriage did not survive my affair. Fortunately, my ex-MW's did.

 

All we can do is pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off and move on to whatever life next has in store for us.

 

Let the debate rage.

[RecordProducer]

Some people cheat out of revenge, because they are hurt or have been hurt in the past. (like the wife who said her hubby criticizes her weight and sometimes she wants to cheat on him just to prove herself that she is still attractive).

Some get bored of the marriage or are disappointed in their spouses (not in love anymore) and seek excitement yet want to preserve the marriage, because they are conservative or comfortable in it or for financial reasons or because of the kids or all together (like Marie's MM).

Some people are low class and have no moral codex so they find it normal to cheat, it's a part of their mentality and personality. I think this is the worst reason and this kind of people should be dumped once for good.

 

A Swedish actress and writer Liv Ullmann said once: "If you're in love you can't cheat; if you're not in love then there is no one to cheat on." This gives another perspective of it. We usually take the viewpoint of the betrayed party and that's how we determine cheating. While some men who can state that I cheated on them, I can say I cheated on no one, because I've never cheated while I was in love and at the same time felt I was loved!

[sylviaguardian]

Originally posted by MySugaree

The debate continues: one person's explanation is another's excuse. On one side are the Players--folks who are having, or had, an affair. Players seek not so much forgiveness as understanding. Affairs don't happen in a vacuum, and players attempt--with varying degrees of success--to place their affairs in context.

 

On the other side sit the Judgers. To Judgers, all explanations are attempted rationalizations. The world, to Judgers, is populated by two types: people of strong character who have the discipline, fortitude and moral backbone to resist temptation; and people of weak character, who possess no fortitude and who are morally spineless.

 

The twain never meet. Players and Judgers talk past each other on these boards. Even when discussion is polite, there's never any meeting of the mind.

 

 

Let the debate rage.

 

Ha, ha!! This is the first post on LS that has made me laugh out loud. You are so RIGHT!

 

Sylvia

[harleygirl92156]

I think sometimes, lots of times people cheat simply because they are selfish. We can't blame the person who was betrayed by making them feel like they did something wrong and weren't meeting the cheaters needs. That may be true, but it is the cheaters responsibility to let the betrayed know their needs are not being met!

Cheating is a selfish, ego boosting, inconsiderate, disrespectful act.....period.

[Mz. Pixie]

Dazed,

 

I'm not going to flame you!

 

You made some valid points. I should have just ended the marriage before then, but I kept trying to hold on in vain hoping that he would change.

 

I don't want to sound like I'm making excuses for my actions but I did go through alot personally before the actual A started. I got pg with my daughter, had health problems with her- then my mother was extremely ill. I helped support her financially until she died (and she had been abusive to me) and I paid for her funeral because there was no one to. Then, I had to move my grandmother into my home (she was 93) so she required alot of care. Then I had a hysterectomy and my grandmother died a week later. Paid for her funeral. I didn't really get time to recover physically or emotionally from either. I went back to work in two weeks. We had tons of financial problems because of the two burials. In between this time I also found out my brother was a crack addict and had to cut off contact with him. I went through all of this working a full time, extremely stressful job and taking care of two kids- mostly by myself. I was in a deep depression and had anxiety and stress related health problems. Looking back I can see that I wasn't thinking clearly- at all- I wasn't even myself. After all of this and after I told him I wanted a separation, I had to check into the hospital because I had a breakdown of sorts.

 

I hate to tell that story because I know people think I don't want to take responsibility for my actions. I know that I'm responsible for what I did- but what I did was only part that contributed to the downfall of my marriage.

 

I know that some people just cheat because they want to or they can. I took my marriage very seriously- and the vows kept me there alot longer than if I wouldn't have taken it so seriously.

 

I still say that if my husband would have just stepped up a little when I needed him to or asked him to, I would still be married- I would have never cheated. I had been asking for years before I did what I did- and I had opportunities way before that. I mean if he would have given back just the smallest amount it would have been enough to keep me going. He just wouldn't. He didn't think he had "time" to take care of his marriage. Our relationship was always on the backburner with him.

 

One reason I'm posting on this forum is to try and prevent other people from going through what I went through. You know, even though he abandoned me emotionally a long time ago- and he did all these things to me- no one cares about that now. All they care about is that I cheated- that is the only thing that anyone remembers. I just don't think that's fair. But I know life isn't fair and what I did wasn't fair. I have to live with the guilt over what I did, and that's very very hard. I wouldn't wish what I've been through on anyone.