After an Emotional Affair: Are You Acting the Same?

Posted on 15. Mar, 2010 by Linda in After the Affair, Emotional Affairs

I think often about whether or Doug is putting the same effort and emotions into our relationship as he did with his emotional affair. Though I don’t think the word “effort” is appropriate when it comes to an affair. In fact, I believe that was part of the appeal. Everything was effortless. I’m sure it didn’t feel like work, it just came naturally and it was something he wanted to do. Why was it effortless? Was it because we were unable to bring out the best in each other? Are we not meant to be together? Why can’t Doug consistently give me what I believe he gave her?

I believe any spouse who is going through this kind of situation feels the same way as I do. I also think that the betrayed spouse feels the need to provide the excitement and affirmation that their spouses experienced during their affair. So why is it so difficult for them to reciprocate? To completely give forth as much effort into their marriage as they did in their affair?

If you had access to phone logs, emails etc. as I did, you would be able to witness the extent of conversation and the amount of time your spouse spent making the other person feel special and loved. If they were not doing those things then the relationship wouldn’t have progressed the way it did.

Just think of how differently things would be if your spouse did those things with you. Maybe we all wouldn’t be in this mess to begin with.

While we were discussing this subject the other day, Doug asked me if he ever did act that way in our relationship. Honestly it is hard for me to remember. I am sure at the beginning he did, but as time went on those efforts and gestures somewhat subsided, which is typical in most long-term relationships. However, I always felt beautiful, desirable and wanted for the majority of our marriage, so he must have made some kind of effort for that to be the case.

It’s not that at times he doesn’t make me feel that way; it just doesn’t seem to come naturally to him, like I believe it did with Tanya. It really breaks my heart that I am not always on his mind as she was. Based on the phone logs and the things that he told me about their relationship, I could tell that she was always front and center in his mind. As soon as he woke up he would text her, then call and text all during the day just to touch base, make arrangements and make an effort to leave work to see her. It is hard for me to know that he had the ability to be that way with someone else and that he just doesn’t “think about” doing those things with me.

Before the emotional affair, I am not so sure I would have thought or cared so much about all this, nor expected it like I do now. Unfortunately, now I don’t think there is anything else in the world I want more. I want to know that Doug has the passion and the desire to be with me the way he was with her. I know that he would say, “It wasn’t that big of deal”, or “we didn’t do anything that special.” However, I have a hard time believing differently.

I know he believes that I think much too deeply about all of this and I know that it is not healthy to compare the two situations. I know that I should not judge his desire and love for me based on my perception of how he acted during his affair. I know that I need to look at the whole picture. However, know that for a person in my situation it is understandable to wonder if he feels the same way about me that he felt about her. Did his actions really display his true feelings for her?

I know that in a lot of ways I am being unrealistic. I know that any long term relationship cannot keep up such a high level of intensity. I know I need to look at the big picture and everything thing that we do have together. In many ways we do have so much more because we are in a long term relationship. However, right now I want to be the selfish one. What I want from Doug is the attention and the desire he displayed during his affair. I also want the security and the comfort that we have from being in a long term relationship. Right now in order for me to heal from his emotional affair, I want and need it all. I know it may require a little more effort and thinking on his part, and I know it may require him to change the way he participates in “our” relationship. I think that our marriage is worth the effort. I hope that he feels the same.

After the Emotional Affair: Questioning Every Decision

Stupid Things I’ve Done After the Emotional Affair

Recover From an Affair – Surviving the Holidays

Tags: after an affair, emotional affair

17 Responses to “After an Emotional Affair: Are You Acting the Same?”

michael
15. Mar, 2010
Another wonderful post Linda….
With every post from you, you seem to nail my feelings to the tee. I read your posts thinking “I know I’m not alone in my thoughts”. I too had access to her phone record. And I read communications she didn’t delete in time. I still to this day look at how much time (hours on the phone, thousands of text back and fourth) and reread emails that we sent each other. Because we still don’t talk about what happened and what’s on her mind, I try and find meaning in her words she did share. I see hope in the words that Doug posts. Hoping someday to hear them ( similar) from her. Our communication has dropped of tremendously over the last few weeks. And I find myself resenting it and not showing her how much I love her. She has so much pain in her and an unwillingness to work on it.
I mentioned to her, the other day, how I’m not seeing her work on us. He response was that I’m just blind to what she is doing. So I asked her to point out what she was doing that I’m missing. Her response was “alright”. What does that mean? Is it that she can’t point it out. Or that she doesn’t want to.
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- admin
  15. Mar, 2010
  Michael,
  I can relate to what you are saying. Doug and I were at that same place about a year ago. I felt like I wanted to move on and make our marriage wonderful, however I was afraid to let go of the past for fear I would forget and become naive again. Your wife may be feeling like she doesn’t want to go anywhere. Moving forward or back would force her to think about everything. Thinking and changing would then produce guilt. That is something that is very hard to live with as a betrayer.
  During their affair they did everything to justify what they were doing to alleviate the guilt. They put most of the blame on us so they wouldn’t feel the pain. Think about how bad you feel when you recall the ways you could have been a better husband. I get sick to my stomach when I remember some of the ways I treated Doug. It is not something that I really want to talk or think about. Now put yourself in her shoes. I would hope that she is feeling a hundred times as bad as you do.
  As much as this stinks, she has to learn to trust you and feel comfortable enough to express how she is feeling. I kept wanting to talk to Doug in hopes that it would help me understand why he did this and in attempt to become closer to him. I have learned that I will never truly understand and wanting to know everything only made me feel worse.
  I have learned that the way to feel closer is to focus only on us and our relationship. Leave the affair, the reasons, the inquiries out of it. Work on today. Has she shown signs of being remorseful? Is she moving toward you more than she did a month ago? I know how difficult is it to continue being patient, and asking yourself how much more can you put up with. At times I did get very angry and resentful. I would wonder why I was doing this? I felt sorry for myself and thought I didn’t deserve this.
  I believe the comment from Carla could be helpful. I agree that maybe you are trying and thinking too much. I know that trying to save my marriage consumed my life. I focused on that and how Doug was feeling every minute of the day. Finally I realized that I needed to step back and do things for myself, to not try so hard and to allow Doug to take some of the responsibility. It really helped. I stopped being so resentful and Doug realized that I wasn’t going to take full control of saving our marriage. Through his daily posts I hope you are witnessing his transformation. I feel blessed every day that we have made this journey together. He has become the husband that I married 25 years ago, and hopefully I am the wife that he married as well.–Linda
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Carla
15. Mar, 2010
Michael, I have read so many of your posts. I was particularly interested in one you posted last month concerning you being brought up in a loving home and that you are a sensitive (emotional?) guy etc etc. You responded to me about the ‘loving’ card my daughter in law sent my son, although she is acting withdrawn and ‘odd’. I have come to the conclusion that she is emotionally immature and is seeking either something ‘better’, or just trying to create a bit of drama in her life.
She now seems to think that housework, cooking and shopping are beneath her and she just wants to be wined and dined. I think she is waiting to meet a millionaire – or possibly a billionaire. Hmm..I think she will find it’s not all wining and dining even if you DO hook a rich man.
It seems to me that women DO cheat on good guys. I guess that’s because good guys are trusting and treat women well and there are women who take full advantage of that fact after they marry them. Is it because some women get bored with ‘predictable’ men – I think that’s possibly so. Unfortunately, so it seems to me that both ‘good’ women and ‘good’ men get taken advantage of in every walk of life.
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Carla
15. Mar, 2010
Michael, I just wanted to add that maybe you are trying too hard?
Perhaps you should back off a bit and let your wife make the effort instead. You seem to be doing everything and looking for signs of recovery. You dont seem to be getting much feedback from her so it must be so frustrating for you. Maybe Admin can offer some advice in that direction?
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- admin
  15. Mar, 2010
  Carla, That can be excellent advice. We wrote a post some time ago to that effect: http://www.emotionalaffair.org/backing-off-can-be-powerful/
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michael
15. Mar, 2010
In backing off I start to feel more and more like I did 8 month ago. I see her happier day to day. And I see myself feeling less and less desired. She tried harder when she thought she would lose me and our life. Now that she knows I’m not going anywhere, does she feel she doesn’t have to try so hard. I’ve expressed it to her time and time again. I tell her I don’t feel desired by her. I tell her what I need. And every time its the same answer. “I am trying, you just don’t see it”. I ask her to show me. And she just agrees and says she will try harder. Each and every time.
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- admin
  15. Mar, 2010
  Michael, How do you want her to show her desire for you? Linda sees signs of love and desire in me in small things like asking her to go on a walk, making her lunch, or patting her on the butt, for example.
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michael
15. Mar, 2010
My wife is dependable in every part of her life except when it comes to me. She volunteers a lot of time for our kids sports. She will go in to work on days off. She will help my mom when she asks. We take my sisters kids to practice. But that devotion comes before any plans or time for us. She has canceled several plans for “date night” because something came up. So much that I gave up asking her to do things like that. And to this day she hasn’t asked me to do anything like that.
When I come to bed she is usually asleep early or watching tv. She tells me all the time that she is tired. A lot of times if I lay down next to her she turns away from me.
Every day when she is taking the kids to school before work I have been walking her to the truck to kiss them all goodbye. If she come home after me I was greating her at the door. But if I come home after her she just sits on the couch doing her facebook and says hi honey. She said that she feels comfort that I’m home but doesn’t know how to show that same affection back.
I think she is beautiful and have a hard time not grabbing, touching, or holding her every chance I get. But its a rare occasion that she comes to me to hold or kiss or touch me. The times that I have seen that were when she was afraid of loosing me. And on days that I was feeling good and confident. On those really good days. That’s just what I thought of right now to say. Things that have bugged me this week.
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- admin
  16. Mar, 2010
  Michael, based on what you’ve just written, your situation is much like it was prior to my affair. Linda acted similarly towards me as your wife does towards you. I came to find out later that it was because of some deep-seated resentment towards me based on the crappy way I treated her at times. Perhaps something like that is going on in your situation. Another possibility is that she is harboring resentment or going through withdrawal from the loss of her affair relationship. Experts say that ending an affair can be like losing a loved one. Just a thought.
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Broken
12. Apr, 2010
Linda… once again you hit the spot. After I found out about my husbands EA, I wondered why he couldn’t be that flirty and spontaneous with me. He gave me an answer that I didn’t like, but at least he was honest. He said that it was because she was something new and exciting, it was like dating someone all over again. The beginning of the relationship is always this way and comes naturally to all people in a new fling. He couldn’t be that way with me because that “phase” had passed in our relationship. We weren’t a new couple anymore. I hate that he said cute little things to her, those words and feelings are mine. His heart is supposed to belong to me, I earned it! What did she do to earn that? Nothing. I still feel as though my husband had feelings for her, although he denies it to the bloody end. Do those words they say to each other come from the heart? Or are they words that just made the relationship that much more interesting and exciting? I personally can not imagine saying anything romantic to another person unless it came from my heart. I don’t let my feelings out to just anyone. What bothers me the most is that now we have nothing to talk about. And I think… why not? Why did my husband and the OW have hours of emailing and phone conversations and him and I can’t say more than hello and goodbye? My husband also says that I’m making too much of the relationship he shared with the OW. He says I’m blowing it out of proportion, that it wasn’t that “special”. Well, if it wasn’t that “special” why keep it going for TWO years? AHHH!!! I feel like I will never move past this. Affairs of the heart really break your heart in so many ways.
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- admin
  12. Apr, 2010
  Broken, I can relate to everything you are saying, so much in fact that just minutes before I checked our comments I was on the phone with Doug. After I hung up I checked to see how long we talked, five minutes, I was disgusted to think that he was able to spend hours on the phone with her and only minutes with me. I wondered too what is wrong with us, don’t we have anything to talk about? I worry about those kind of things everyday. I wish that I could appear new and exciting in Doug’s eyes, and that Doug could also be fresh and perfect in mine. Unfortunately we have been together too long for that to happen. I wonder is that a bad thing? Isn’t that what being in a lasting, committed relationship should be? Before the affair I never questioned how much we communicated, how many times we said I love you during the day, now it is always in the front of my mind. I suppose that is a positive, I am making an effort to never take him for granted again, but I hate the comparison there shouldn’t be anything else to compare it to. It should have remained “our” relationship, as imperfect as it was, not “their relationship” and “our marriage”.
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  - admin
    13. Apr, 2010
    Broken, I just had another revelation about the excessive communication during an affair. I thought back to the time when Doug was involved with Tanya. He was in his own little world only focusing on her. It was very apparent by the phone logs that he was working very much. He would spend most of his working day texting, talking and seeing her. When he got home he would stay in his office, I am sure emailing her or he would sit on the couch and stare at the TV, thinking about the next time he would be seeing or talking to her. There wasn’t much interaction with his family or need to fulfill his obligations around the house. Think about how wonderful our relationship would be if we only had to focus on each other. How much we would have to talk about and share. That is why an affair is an illusion and a marriage is reality.
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Broken
13. Apr, 2010
Linda, I remember seeing my husband on the phone texting and emailing before I found out about the EA, at the time he said it was “work”. He would email her while we were on vacation, at the park with the kids, and during dinner. Every waking moment he had was spent with her on the phone. Meanwhile…. they work together! So they had all day to talk and email, why bring it home?! My husband says that the OW never interfered with our family life, because he was always home. Yes he was HOME…. but mentally his mind and heart were somewhere else. I should have known at the time that something wasn’t right, but when you have full TRUST in someone you don’t think they are capable of doing such awful things. Our conversations now are dull and boring, and when we do talk, we usually discuss the EA and what happened.
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Broken
13. Apr, 2010
Linda, I also wanted to add that I often question whether or not my husband and I are compatible. If we were, wouldn’t we have something more to talk about? We never had deep conversations about life or our dreams, he had those conversations with her and not me. Why? Is it me? Is she more appealing emotionally than I am? Why can’t he stay up late and talk to me about anything. Can’t we have enjoyable conversations that make us feel emotionally connected? I’m not so sure. Is an emotional affair something that just happens, because two people meet at the right time and place, or is there a strong attraction that draws them together, because they have so much in common, because they click well with each other. I often imagine that if he had meet her before me or at the same time as me, that he would definitely pick her over me. I feel inferior, like I can’t provide something that he so desperately needs. And sometimes I think, I don’t want to provide him with that emotional need, especially not now, after he broke my heart. How do I give you my heart and undivided attention when you gave your heart and undivided attention to her? Why should I try to fix something he broke? I feel like he gets to have all the fun with the EA and what comes with it, and in the end, I suffer the most and now I have the burden of trying to repair a marriage that I’m not even sure I want anymore.
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Last2know
13. Apr, 2010
I know that feeling all too well and my H was in the same Daze and isolation. Now I text him all day sweet nothings and yes some “dirty talk”too and he responds as often as I text. Unless he’s in a meeting or something of that nature. But he always gets back to me. We have to make that happen, it’s hard and silly but it’s working for my husband. I am still recovering but I am trying my best to bring the fun flirtiness back in.
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- admin
  13. Apr, 2010
  Last2know, It’s amazing what little things like that can do, isn’t it?
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Broken
13. Apr, 2010
Last2know… It’s nice to hear that you are trying to rekindle that passion. I tried doing the same with my husband, but it felt like we were acting. I guess because we both knew that I was trying to recreate what he shared with the OW, when we did the emailing, it didn’t come as natural as it did between the two of them. Do you feel the same? I am constantly comparing myself and our relationship to her and their relationship. Sometimes I wonder if my husband is just emailing back to make me feel better or if he really means what he is writing. Not sure what to think.
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