I have been reading a lot lately, on word press, blogs about infidelity, and cheating. I have read stories written by mistresses, and their belief that it “isn’t thier fault”, that they are “helping the marriage”, that husbands can confide in the mistress things that he could never discuss with his wife. And, I have been reading responses by men who have had affairs who basically feel that keeping the contact going with the other woman even after the wife knows, and the affair is supposedly over, even if that means keeping that contact a secret from their wife, is okay! WOW! I’m not sure where morality or the reality and the commitment of marriage has gone to, but fromwhere I sit I think that is all a bunch of hog wash!
Here is my take on affairs. I think infidelity is a cowards way of escaping from problems he/she doesn’t want to deal with. There are only two people who know what really goes on in a marriage…so no matter what the “cheater” tells his/her lover they never know the whole truth no matter how much they think they know that their lover is tortured in their marriage, mistreated etc etc etc. In an affair you don’t have to deal with the realities of life like the bills, the kids, illness, taking out the garbage, driving kids around, work, balancing the checkbook, cooking dinner for a family…the real life day to day grind of a marital relationship. In an affair you are living in a cinderella wonderland..possibly the land that you had hoped your marriage would be, but the reality is that marriage is not disneyland. So, to all you mistresses out there who think you are doing your married man a huge favor by listening to his problems, and hanging on his every word about how tortured his life is,making love as often as you are together because “his wife never wants to” remember there are two sides to a story and two lives in that marriage. And, no matter how much you want to believe that the people in that family will not be adversely affected by the extramarital affair you are wrong. The kids are affected, it will affect the way they look at relationships for the rest of their lives. The spouse will be affected…trust doesn’t come easy to begin with. Add to that infidelity and it is almost impossible to get it back. In future relationships or if your marriage does manage to make it through the affair, you will question everything your spouse does. Every time he/she misses a call, doesn’t come home on time, isn’t where they are supposed to be, your mind goes back to that time of unfaithfulness. Forgiveness can happen…forgetting is another story!
So, I guess the message of this post is this: If your marriage is in trouble, do your darndest to fix it. If it is unfixable wait till you have ended that relationship before moving on to another. Don’t go around sharing intimate things about your marriage with someone of the opposite sex…that leads to temptation which leads to trouble. If you need to talk to an outside party to get perspective turn to a friend who is the same sex you are or a counselor. But never ever stop communicating with your spouse! Your partner should be the first and foremost person you run to when you need a refuge, when you feel insecure, when you feel pressure and fear. If the two of you can’t communicate get help doing so! Making someone else of the opposite sex your confidante, as possibly controlling as it may sound, is NOT a good idea! Can men and women be friends? Yes. But a true friend of the opposite sex would want to be friends with both parts of the marriage not just one part!
That’s just my humble opinion!
Lwayswright's Weblog 
Good one, Lori!! David got to rip our lives apart 20 years ago with his longest lasting mistress. It took most of those 20 yrs to get to the point where I rarely thought about it, and when I did, it didn’t hurt quite as much. Then he revives the relationship with that woman and throws us back into the past to relive those horrible old feelings all over again. We are still reeling from it but he is “Forgiven by God” so all is good for him. Too bad-so sad for the rest of us!! It’s really hard forgiving those seventy times seven times!!! I think the funny thing is that when he married #2 after their affair, they didn’t trust each other:) Wonder if that is happening for him now with #3. If they’ll do it with you, they’ll do it to you!!
Must get to bed now. I love you and miss you!!! I hope you are feeling better!!!
your humble opinion is a good one. and i dont think its so humble- it sounds/looks to me like you are a really well educated, great person, mom and wife.
as a former mistress, i would never say the affair wasnt my fault. but i know it wasn’t all of it. i also have never said it was my ex’s wife’s fault. i have never said she did things that pushed him away… in other words, i never felt bad for my ex ever. in fact, unlike a lot of the blogs you read- i didn’t let him talk about his marriage with me in a way where i was “helping” him with his issues. i knew what the issues were, i knew what they were doing on the weekends, i saw cute videos of his son on his cell phone, i wasn’t blind to his marriage life- i just never felt the need to help him with that part of his life.
i agree that affairs are a way to escape problems… but i wouldn’t say they are a “cowards” way in all cases. i was not conscious of why i was drawn into an affair situation until i went to therapy after. this was part of my first post on my blog. i wasn’t a coward… i just didn’t have good relationships modeled for me as a child. so even though i was, unfortunately, involved in an affair… i have learned more about relationships and marriage from it than anything else ive ever encountered. i am a much better person because of it. and i would never have another affair.
i wish you and your family the best! enjoy your weekend.
I didn’t necessarily mean that it was a cowards way out for the mistress…I actually was referring to the adulterer or married person in that situation. Typically the one who is the mistress or the other man if it is a woman having an affair (I do realize that women cheat on their husbands as well…no excuse there either!) anyway, the other person usually is single, and has an outside life that doesn’t involved kids, or financial responsibilities or worries that involve an entire family, or illness worries involving their spouse or kids..they have outside lives other then the affair. However, for the spouse it is truly an escape from reality of life. Instead of facing things head on, they turn to another person, someone who they don’t have to deal with those things with, they can pretend those things don’t exsist when they are with that other person. It is a fantasy! And, usually the spouse who is being cheated on is none the wiser until later and ends up feeling like an idiot for not knowing or not realizing what was going on right under their noses. I’m glad that you got help for your stuff…I’m glad that you realized it was wrong and that it isn’t the wife’s fault! And I truly wish you well in finding love in your life! Thanks for the response to my post!
I’m actually one of those people that just recently started posting about this on my blog. As a cheating husband, I’ll take issue with just one thing you say. Cheating husbands aren’t “cowards” that are looking to “escape” their problems, we’re “assholes” that haven’t “dealt” with our problems…or aren’t even aware of them….or just can’t figure their shit out. Guys often blame the misstress, but it usually has 0 to do with the misstress (except for making herself available, of course).
Wow, thanks for your response….and I would agree with your assessment of cheating husbands, I just thought the word “coward” was a bit gentler then the word you used to describe them! And, it does have to do with the mistress because, like the cheating spouse, he/she has made a choice to interfere in a marriage, to cause hurt and ruin to a family…that is HER choice not JUST the spouses. And, for some women I think it is a game they play…or a way of life they prefer in order to avoid the reality of a true committment! And, those women, like cheating spouses, need help to get over that issue! Thanks again for your comment!
I’d love to read your blog…
I’m very interested in a man’s perspective on his affair.
OH YEAH ! LOVE IT , BLOGGED IT , FACEBOOKED IT , TWITTERED IT …;O)
My 2 cents to it :
I don’t think that the worse thing in being ‘cheated on’ is to forgive, no I believe that it is “to trust again”
;o)
v
Hey I love this “humble” opinion- It really takes into account many aspects of affairs- Thanks for sharing.
I’m glad that you enjoyed it!
What a well written post & I completely agree! Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this issue because lately it seems like I hear more and more about infidelity and cheating as an acceptable choice…something I never understood.
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Thanks for this post. As a married woman recovering from my own affair with a married man, I appreciate your perspective. And I appreciate that you popped over to my blog to leave a comment. What I (we) did was wrong. There is no excuse for it. I turned to him and he turned to me when our marriages seemed to be on the rocks. I realize the error in my ways for not turning to my husband- who now, after finding out about the affair- wants nothing more than to repair our marriage and move forward. He has forgiven, but he has not forgotten. We start marriage counseling next week, and for the first time in a long time, I think we are both looking forward.
It is, oddly enough, easier to forgive then forget. And, it is the forgetting, or lack of, that often causes the problems! Its something that replays in your head over and over, the thought of someone you love with someone else…the imagination is a wonderful and horrible thing. Best of luck to you!
LOVED your humble opinion….it hit the nail on the head! Great post. Thanks for visiting my blog! I’ve added you to my links!
thank you thank you! I get sort of emotional about the topic…I think it hits a nerve!
hi, stumbled across your blog for the first time today..
i am married and had an almost 4 year affair with a married man. i has been over a few months now..
and you are very right, an affair DOES adversely affect everyone involved.. i never intended for his wife to find out. she did. i didn’t expect his 4 children to find out about us, they did.. it was a mess..
my affair has affected EVERYTHING in my life.. and my husband does not know about it.. the affair has left its mark in so many areas of my life..
its a mess… there is lots of healing being done…
I am happy that I found your blog. Wow, it has been 3 years and I still fight everyday to “get over it”. I have forgiven my husband but his affair was a little different as I was exposed to the “other woman” for quiet sometime. She worked with him and they were only together for approximately 6 weeks. We got back together pretty quickly since we had been married for 20 years at the time and best friends.
My husband and I had been going through a rough period for awhile. I had gotten a job as a flight attendant and was traveling a lot. The thought of cheating on him NEVER entered by mind. He just went to work one day and texted me that he wouldn’t be coming home. I was blown away. This is when I decided to check our cell phone records and found that there were 371 text messages from a number that was 5 hours away from our home. I called and found out her name. A couple of days later she calls me back and tells me they haven’t slept together but were extremely attracted to each other.
Long story short, he didn’t stay with her long and rushed back home to me when he was afraid that I may join in his little infidelity club with one of the pilots.
She texted and emailed all of the horrid details of their short lived LOVE affair as she called it. It was horrible to have to listen to the things that a wife shouldn’t have to listen to. She never had any shame. This has been a slow climb back to a marriage that had always been good. I forgave him and tried to understand how he could throw our marriage away for a woman that was one year older than my oldest daughter. It has been hard. My husband has been so remorseful and has treated me better than he ever has for the past 3 years. I struggle with it all by myself. I don’t talk to anyone about my feelings. I look for others who have gone through this and try to learn how they forget. The forgiving is easy when you love someone but forgetting is impossible. Thanks for your post and comments. They help more than you all will ever know.
I agree. It’s not just the sex, it’s the talk. That’s the real betrayal (although the sex is also a betrayal of course). If I ever found out my husband was cheating on me and discussing our marriage with a lover, I would have my bags packed faster than you can say “asshole.”
I can’t say that I’ve ever had an affair, been a mistress, or have been privy to my husband having an affair. But recently, I’ve been asked to try and advise another couple on their marriage (the man having cheated – if not when they were married, confirmed before) and the one difference between them and us is communication. They have no interest in communicating. As you and your readers have emphasized, communication is everything.
I am a bit confused by your posts. I get the impression that you put the blame on the mistress.- a great deal of it anyway, I put the blame in the husband for cheating, He is the one that is responsible for what he is doing. To put the blame on a person who have no relation at all to the betrayed one isn´t right, She is a mislead since she only have one channel for information – the husband, And if he keeps wining about his marriage and what a hell he has – what should she believe? If he says the are having a divorce soon….why blame the mistress? She is attracted by that male specimen no matter how stupid he is. She believes what she wants to believe – without knowing it she is fooled too.
I cannot agree in that mistresses are “helping the marriage” but I do disagree in is the mistress fault. I presume that in many cases – at least when we talk about net cheating – there would have been another person if not this mistress had been available. It is so easy to connect with people on the net. I have been in touch with many men so desperate that ANY women would have been sufficient. Anyone at all., These guys are bastards indeed – but do not blame the mistress in these cases. There would have been another one if that man had decided to cheat.
The one who is the guilty one is the husband. He is the one that is responsible to his wife – not the mistress. You cannot transfer that guilt to third person outside the marriage. You cannot put the blame on her. She is perhaps not a victim as well but at least mislead by the husband.
Everyone is responsible for his/her own relations.. The mistress has no relation with the wife.
That’s just ridiculous. Of course the mistress shares responsibility for the affair. It takes two to tango. If the mistress is unaware there’s a wife, that’s a different story, but when she knowingly engages in an affair, she is helping with the deception of the wife. Cheaters, men and women both, always have some reason why they justify being unfaithful to their spouse. If you allow them to lie to you, like you know they are lying to the wife, you are not only helping to deceive her, but yourself, as well, and you are guilty. No, the mistress is not married to the wife, but when she has an affair with the husband, she becomes the mistress and creates a relation to the wife. They are sharing the same penis. I can’t think of anything more intimate. The guilt belongs to the cheater and the person who facilitates the cheating (the mistress). The wife is the only one unaware of the deception. If you are tempted by a married man and you believe his home life is so bad, you should tell him to leave his wife and not engage with him until he has done so. At least if you’re going to do this, own it. Don’t say the mistress doesn’t have to feel guilt because she is just as guilty as the cheating husband. She is possibly tearing apart a family and what may have been a happy home without her interference. Maybe the man would talk to his wife and fix his problems with her if he didn’t have you encouraging him not to.