vulnerable to an affairEvery Monday morning I perform the same task…I search for content to add to the Higher Healing member’s area. This week one of the audios I discovered was on the topic of “How to Have an Affair.”

Now, the audio by no means promotes infidelity, rather, it focuses on the behaviors and thoughts that some individuals have that can lead them down the path to having an affair. In many cases these thoughts and behaviors are unintentional.

We thought that the subject would make for a good discussion on the blog, so here we are.

What are some of the behaviors and thoughts that can make one vulnerable to an affair?

Here are several:

  • Lack of clear boundaries
  • Flirting
  • Involvement with porn
  • Using drugs and/or alcohol
  • Lack of accountability
  • Risk taking
  • Low self-esteem
  • Afraid of confrontation
  • Lack of self-control
  • Selfishness, etc.

Our experience with talking to people who have had affairs indicates that many of them have no clue what really led them down the path to infidelity. Most often the blame is placed squarely on the shoulders of the betrayed. This is their story and their sticking to it because they haven’t done any real introspection or self-analysis to know that the affair was not about their partner whatsoever.

For our discussion this week, please consider the following questions…

As a betrayed spouse, what do you feel were the behaviors and/or thoughts that led your spouse to have an affair?

If you are the unfaithful, please share your thoughts as to what left you vulnerable to infidelity.

For both betrayed and unfaithful readers…What do you feel was the catalyst for these behaviors and/or thoughts? Were they learned at an early age or were there others factor/occurrences over time that caused a shift?

How have the behaviors changed since the affair was discovered?

Please share your thoughts and stories in the comment section below.

See also  Straight from the Horse's Mouth: Why Some People Have Affairs

Thanks!

Linda & Doug

 
 

 

    33 replies to "Discussion – The Thoughts and Behaviors that Make a Person Vulnerable to an Affair"

    • gizfield

      It’s my personal opinion that NO PERSON who cheats does it from a position of strength. Ever. They want you to think that but they do it from a position of WEAKNESS. Either in their character in the case of serial cheaters, or in their circumstances like most cheaters. It is also my opinion that no cheater is worth having at the time they are cheating. This also goes for the THINGS they cheat with. A weak, sorry lot.

    • Strengthrequired

      It’s true giz, as for my cs, it was from a place of depression, midlife. If he had not been in the state of mind he was in, he would have been strong enough to overcome the power of manipulation and would not have even taken a second look at his ow if he was in the right frame of mind. He was in a weak vulnerable state, just right for the picking.
      Strength comes from what they do with the weakness once they see that there is nowhere else to go, except up.

    • CBb

      I agree but I think that in many cases, the CS is the pusher and makes it known they are available.

      I think this is an interesting topic b/c my CH went back to the OW after being apart 6 weeks. She then pursued him and took advantage. However he did not have to answer the initial call or cry for help from her. But he did. And that is part of the affair fog mourning process. He had not gotten over her even though he ended it the first time.

      So as he is telling me how much he loves me, how wonderful we are and how great things are, he is w/ the OW for the next 3 months. So I am not sure you can truly “affair proof” a marriage.

      But that mid life crisis BS brings so many men down. Bored, unhappy, in a rut, not happy w/ the job, etc. I hear from so many women that they are fun, thin(as that seems to be a factor) vibrant, busy being a mom and/or working. So why do we as women mostly feel content and satisfied but men use this crap as an excuse to justify their choice and behavior? My CH asked me when I will have my mid-life crisis. I just laughed b/c my first thought was to say “when I divorce you”. Of course I have not done that yet and I am not sure I will.

      Basically I am happy with my life, despite two teenagers in the house, a CS, recent close death in the family and work issues. I don’t take my issues out on others and would not cheat to make myself happy. But I have good friends and I am good either married or divorced.

      My CH was the one who did not communicate with me and I was able to accept it. His whole family is like that – non-talkers. He felt disconnected from our marriage and I did not. His solution was to cheat.

      I think after awhile we just become their mothers. They act like kids – let’s see how much I can get away with. And once caught they crumble and cry and beg forgiveness. When I told my CH to leave after his second continued affair with the same OW I told him he had to leave. He refused. I called a friend and made arrangements for him to live elsewhere.

      So he acted like a child. So typical. Smart guy, great dad but typical guy – self centered, selfish and juvenile. I would not expect anything less.

      And if one more person tells me they never would have expected this behavior from my CH I will scream. Because I did not either. That is the sad part. This came out of left field.

      • Jrs

        CBb – this note of yours is so true for me, also: “He felt disconnected from our marriage and I did not. His solution was to cheat.” I also agree the CS is the pusher in many cases and certainly puts out the vibe they are available.

        I told mine to get out after I found out the affair was still ongoing, he crumbled and begged and his mom even called me asking me to not throw him out. We have two young daughters and he is a great dad, also, and I was afraid of what it would do to the girls to have him out of the house just out of thin air. That was almost 4 years ago and we struggle to this day.

        I read the previous post about whose responsibility it is to prevent another affair. I’ve done what the bullets say to do. We’ve had agreements on the fact that he will disclose certain communication, but he doesn’t, etc etc down the list.

        Ironically, I think what makes him vulnerable to another affair is exactly what he’s doing now. Don’t disclose certain communication, leave critical details out of your stories, and so on. Then when I find out, I emotionally take one step back from him. Then another, then another. Naturally, he feels the disconnect. I won’t act on this disconnect by having an affair – I love my family way too much to ever do that. But he has acted on that and I don’t have reason to believe he won’t again. When I call him out about things like why are you texting so and so at 11pm on a Saturday (a work relationship), he says he’s doing nothing wrong. Disclosure of things like that was our agreement, but “he’s doing nothing wrong” by telling me nothing and just letting me see it in the cell phone records. OK.

        The pattern just continues. Non-disclosure, hiding things, twisting the truth, constant communication with women via text at all hours under the guise of work that he doesn’t tell me about. It pushes me futher away, which causes him to feel disconnected, and that leaves us ripe for another affair. It’s disheartening and I don’t have a clue what to do about it. We tried couples counseling, I’ve tried approaching him every different way I can think of, and nothing has worked. We are just here and growing further and further apart.

    • theresa

      It’s such a tangled web. Dr. Bob Huzienga’s list of the type of affair helped me to unravel some of it.
      Based on the type of affair, reasons dictate why, how to handle,and probability of healing and creating a good marriage.
      Doug and Linda thanks for all the wonderful support you have given me. You guys leave no stone unturned.

      • Doug

        Thank you for all of your contributions Theresa. If you can think of any stones that need to be turned over, just let us know! 😉

    • Broken2

      My CS was the biggest flirt I have ever known……he got his ego boosted by flirting so I would say low self esteem as well. He never had clear boundaries and thought it was a ok to hug other woman, take them to dinner and lunch all of which I begged him to stop for years and he saw it as harmless so selfishness is definitely a quality. I often wonder why it took an affair for him to open his eyes and that is still a source of anger if I think about it…which I rarely do anymore. When I read about why people cheat today, nearly 4 years later, I wonder what made me so gullible and so trusting. I would never put up with that crap today…ever. I will not take responsibility for his affair and I loathe those “experts” who try and make a BS somehow responsible. My husband made a clear choice and he was probably a little bit of all of the qualities listed so I am sure they played a part in it. He has changed who he was…thankfully.

    • Peggy

      In my case I was the pleaser. We didn’t have an conflict in our marriage because it was my sole desire, unconsciously, to do whatever I needed to do to make him happy. I thought that was what being married was about. Of course, I ASSUMED that he had the same values. After the discovery of his affair his passive/aggressive behavior came alive. I hadn’t known that part of him because I never pushed any of his buttons. He had been harboring resentment for years over one phone call that he felt I slighted his feelings. It built from there. He never gave me any indication that he was unhappy at all. He was a pro at lying. His affair partner was a co-worker and they flirted and played with each other for 4 years and it escalated when she told him she was filing for divorce. It didn’t end until she moved away to be with another man that he didn’t know about. So, in essence, in his mind, he was cheated on as well. I did feel that having an affair was the end game to the marriage, but in this marriage it never entered my mind to even address that issue. We were the happy couple that everyone said they wanted to model their relationship on.

    • chiffchaff

      This is a timely discussion for me. The flirty co worker has ramped up a gear such that I try to avoid being in close proximity. He stares at me, tells me inappropriate things, runs his wife down to me, all the textbook stuff. Its made me see cs in a new perspective. This man is highly respected at work but to me he seems to have very little self respect or esteem such that he is contantly on the hunt for an ego boost. Its becoming a problem as I think my h has noticed, other work colleagues have noticed and small comments are being dropped. Its also tricky as he’s going to be my line manager soon. Its not bad enough to be harassment, yet. It’s disturbing to see this side of the fence given what I’ve been through.
      hi all btw. I visit occasionally.

    • Villageidiot

      Well, I was the cheater. More than once. with multiple partners. Not only with this wife but my first wife too. And even my girlfriends in between. I am by all definitions a serial cheater. Why? Let me start by saying that cheating ran in the family. My father cheated, my mother cheated, my brothers cheated and even other members of the family cheated. So it came naturally. As a family we did not have much spiritual up-bringing. God was not a guiding light in our lives. Are moral teachings were few.
      My mother, although she loved us, was more or less just trying to get through life without another episode of the ever, on-going shenanigans of my father, who was a great provider of food, clothing and the occasional gift or pat on the head, but was a womanizer and binge alcoholic. So when finally my mother got enough gumption she decided to have little flings and affairs with other men to make her life more bearable,
      I was exposed to sex at an early age by a male cousin who like for us to play doctor. He made seem to secret and naughty, which it was, but it raised my curiosity to levels not normally felt in a boy of 6 or 7.
      I always was being teased as a kid because I was a red-headed, freckled-faced, shy, timid youngster so my self-esteem was low from the beginning. I was beat up and picked on my whole life until I started to finally stand up for myself when I was about 16. But it was all a façade. Deep down I was still that shy, timid kid. I has problems at school, defying authority and acting up at home. When I got old enough to work I had a difficult time keeping a job because my temper replaced my shyness, To prove to myself that I was a “man” I drank and acted out thinking it as “manly”. I used women and tossed them aside after I got what I wanted and went on to the next crusade. I was an idiot. A lot of it was because I was trying to prove to myself that I “had what it took”. But I was only fooling myself as usual. So, yes, I am living proof that low self esteem, lack of accountability, porn, drugs/alcohol, no boundaries, selfishness, and no clear moral upbringing can and does cause us cheaters to do just that. I feel our world is moving away from the spiritual and more towards a “who cares” way of living. I’m with my second wife still, and she has been through hell. I have cheated, been forgiven, cheated again, been forgiven, and cheated again, over and over. She has brought all of these behaviors to my attention and more or less taught me to look at myself. Thank God! It’s been almost a year since my last EA. I have not lied to her in almost a year and I feel better about myself. I’m hoping she will see this whole thing true but her patience is running very thin. So, if you read this and you are in the same boat as I am it’s time to look within, ask yourself about your thoughts and behaviors. Get a little spiritual, It’s not too late I hope. But, again, all of the behaviors listed above will do nothing but cause you misery. If you are like me I’d like to hear from you.

    • Angela

      I believe he thought he wasn’t doing anything wrong by entertaining himself with a video game, and he was flirting wildly inappropriately with the woman but says he didn’t think it was flirting, even though he had singled her out for specific attention he didn’t give the others there. He wouldn’t let me be a part of their game either. Then he started talking and texting to her privately on the phone, keeping it secret from me. When he realized I would catch that phone shit pretty quick, he “got permission” from me to do it openly. When I asked for the phone the next day, all their texts & calls were deleted except for the last 8 hours they’d been in contact, and what a day they’d had chasing one another from phone to game and back with texts calling each other sweetie and sweetheart all day! This has been devastating for me and I think I can understand and know him well enough that this was not sexually or romantically motivated, but I don’t think I can get him to understand that transferring all that emotional energy, time and affection to another woman was absolute betrayal. I later found she’d sent him nude photos. Supposedly that was because she also ” misunderstood” his attentions.

      • Angela

        Whatever thoughts he had or justifications he created in his own mind to continue this activity, then lie to me about it in order to keep carrying it out have made me doubt he ever loved me in the first place and doesn’t seem to care that what he needs to do now is give me the reassurance that some how I was supposedly first in his heart throughout this ordeal. I only get my ass chewed up verbally and no matter how gently I pproach the topic his anger only convinces me there is NO love in his heart for me. Yelling at someone that you love them doesn’t make them believe it. It makes me believe he thinks I have no right to even question this behavior. Ready to give up.

    • Gizfield

      Angela, first I’ll say I dont think your husband would have married you if he didn’t love you. if he did, hes probably a psychopath which you definitely don’t want.

      When cheaters are exposed and you stay with them, it empowers them to act like turds, unfortunately. Know that his behavior is wrong and dont listen to his arguments otherwise. He has nothing to be angry about. Hes just trying to deflect your attention away from his bad behavior. Dont accept him blaming you either. Just read as much as you can about Cheater behavior. With minor variations, it’s all been done before.

    • Peggy

      I have been told by my PA Husband that she was sexy, petite, beautiful, a great kisser, has beautiful eyes, loved her long skinny legs and exactly where on his body she touched on him when they were passionately kissing on the days they scheduled their time at work alone after everyone else had left. Of course, all that says to me is that because he loved her so much and loved everything about how she looked and didn’t love me that I was none of those things in his eyes. I just recently was told that he had not been sexually attracted to me for 10 years and this was after he said he got it and knew how to start helping me heal and it’s been 4 years on1/24 since I’ve been going through the hell of him getting angry just hearing her name mentioned.

      I have studied enough and know enough now to know that I am in no way to blame for any of his choices. I know what he was to me and how much I have always loved him and he said he knows he loves me now and yet just last night he was extremely insensitive to my pain. I’m so beat down at this point and am so severely affected with PTSD that I have no desire to go anywhere else or even consider having another relationship. I’m just too damaged to ever bring me to someone else. I’m sleeping on the couch because I don’t want to feel him next to me.

      He was a recovered alcoholic when I met him. Please know everyone that by saying alcoholics are recovered does not mean they have recovered from their addictive personality. He just shifted his addiction to sex and that’s why the affair. It was a high for him every day of our marriage to sexually fantasize about other women and for 4 years he focused that addiction on that beautiful, sexy, 10 years younger than me co-worker.

      He was perfect at his deception and still to this day hasn’t been able to tame the demon enough to even know me well enough to know what NOT to say to me. What I’ve learned from all this horror is that I’ve always been a giver to a fault. I was trained as a child and that’s a hard habit to adjust, but I am getting better at creating my boundaries now. He’s been so used to my doing everything from laundry to what my Mother would call “men’s work” like car repair, plumbing and electrical. I’ve done it all. He gave his OW the man out of the romance novels and I was his rock that took care of everything. I want to be that woman in those romance novels now. I wish I had been the type of woman who just threw her hands up and said, “I just don’t know how to do these man things.” But I wasn’t. It was fun and I took pride in my ability to repair cars and rewire houses and rebuild things that most men take pride in. I’m an artist and I love a challenge. It’s all creative to me. I loved doing it all for me and him, but what that did was take the feminine “helpless” woman that men crave so they can prove their masculinity. He didn’t need that from me. I was his mother, housekeeper, cook and repair man all in one. He got his sexual, need for excitement, danger, secrecy fix out of his addiction to sexual fantasies with as he put it, “all the beautiful women he worked with.” I feel like everything I’ve ever done because I cared has been the wrong thing to make a him happy. But rationally I know that he is the addictive personality not me. He took advantage of who I was and never appreciated it. No one really ever knows another person completely. In my case I knew what he showed me and he left the rest secret. His affair that caused my change in behavior was the button that unleashed his true self. Trying to maintain a relationship with a man who is PA is probably impossible. Most books that I’ve read that talk about affairs say that if your partner is passive aggressive just walk away. I’m very close to working at regaining any sense of self worth so that I can do that. No one can change anyone and I realize now that that is what I’ve been doing because I do love him and have for 15 years. I’ve given him more excuses for his behavior than he has. But as a rape victim and having a great deal of lack of self-confidence around my sexuality, by him telling me he hasn’t been sexually attracted to me for 10 years may be my bottom. It’s odd how it makes me feel. I almost feel dirty for being attracted to him in that way. It will take me a lifetime to get over all the horrible things he has told me that he felt about her and me. Sorry, need to vent right now. I’m so tired and so tired of having to be everything for so many people that have no idea what I’ve been going through. My entire family loves my H and can not understand how I wouldn’t just be able to instantly forgive him. They have no idea and there is just no way that I could come close to explaining so I have literally zero support. People have their own stories and no one in my family wants to change theirs when it comes to my H. He’s a charmer to everyone but me. At this point it’s financial more than anything. I could probably go get social security for all my issues but I just can’t allow the government to have any more control on me than they already do. And then there is the victim issue. I’ve spent my entire life fighting against being seen as a victim. It’s just not who I want to be. But I know my limits now and I know I have no capacity to make it every day to an outside job. All I’ve been for the last 30 years is an artist. Try even getting a job with that resume now. It doesn’t matter that I type 150 wpm, they want referrals for the last 3 years and I haven’t worked in corporate since I was 30 and I’m 63 now. I can’t believe that number when I type it out. I don’t really feel like I’m a day over 40. But emotionally I feel dead and way over 63. I’m sure those of you much younger than me are feeling quite old for your age emotionally after what you have all gone through, too. I may be only 4’11” and 110 lbs, but I can still use a nail gun and climb a 20 foot ladder:) But I can’t seem to heal my broken heart.

    • Gizfield

      Peggy, please do not listen to your husband babble on about this tramp, ever again. I dont know if you have ever seen her, but I dont know many 53 year old sex goddesses. She probably is what I call a Granny Whore. They think they look goooood, but they actually look like dried up old prunes. I’m 56 myself so I’m not trying to dog out older women or anything. I just think hes probably delusional.

    • Gizfield

      Also, I was with an alcoholic for 20 years and I think the non drinking ones may be as bad or worse than the active ones. I dont know if the chemicals change their brains, or if they were just assholes all along. I’m sure some are acually good people but thats not been my experience, personally. Plus, they are so damn sanctimonious. It’s ALL about THEM.

      • Peggy

        It’s called narcissism. And it’s been my experience that they are all assholes! He keeps saying he’s sorry for being an asshole as if it’s past tense. He was an asshole last night to me. I have recently gotten in touch with all of that addictive personality attraction that I have. Everyone I’ve been involved with emotionally has been an addict of some form or another from drink, drugs and food. None of which they were involved in when I met them, but eventually the behaviors surfaced. It may be chemical, but I do think after all my research on this subject that it is inherent by being born with addictive tendencies. I feel very blessed to have not received those tendencies, but my family were what you would call social alcoholics and it was accepted that all their rich friends joined them in getting drunk daily. I also call it functional alcoholics. Like my H, they were all very productive, could get drunk at night and get up and do their jobs with no problems and repeat the process every single day. My sister is an alcoholic, too. I just got raped at 8 and 15 so that has been enough dysfunction for me. But because of my family dynamics I have been attracted to nothing but addictive men. And none of them showed me that side until I was in deep. It’s been hard to accept that I could be so fooled thinking the men I’ve been involved with were ever different from each other. They may have looked different and talked different, but basically every single man I’ve been involved with has had an addictive personality.

        • Peggy

          Oh, and, of course, all their problems were my fault. I’m more than willing to take on some of the responsibilities that caused the fallout for these guys, but I learned and adjusted me. My first husband and father of my children was a total alcoholic and I nagged him something terrible. I didn’t make him drink because I didn’t drink, but I did learn how destructive nagging was so I didn’t do that with the next man. And years later after several other relationships here comes my H now and all I wanted was for him to feel free to pursue his dreams and we share our lives. I later told him that I should have been more specific when I said that. I didn’t mean that it would be okay if he pursued another woman. My bad. And I still haven’t learned the gift of not being sarcastic. But, seriously, I did think that was understood at the time.

    • Peggy

      I met her. I saw her. She’s a total health freak. Has literally no figure. Flat chested, but great legs. Long blond hair and blue eyes. I personally don’t find her that attractive and I’m fairly objective on this. But it doesn’t matter what I think. It only matters how he sees her and how he sees and has seen me. I can go into rational thinking and completely psychoanalyze all the why’s and unrealistic wants, but the heart is another matter. And of course he’s delusional. Who isn’t when they are head over heals with another woman other than their wife. Otherwise they would know that this woman is cheating WITH them and they would never be able to trust her if they ever did get together permanently. But she left him and he came to me with his broken heart and expected me to help him. That’s how delusional he was. From that moment on, being who my defective over helper self was, I went right into research and told him everything I’d learned. It was 2 years before I discovered he was passive/aggressive and nothing that I brought to him would he ever do for me. Still didn’t shut my mouth and I kept getting hurt when his PA kicked in.

      She would never have stayed with him. He didn’t make enough money for her and he was clearly not into physical fitness. She told him she wasn’t going to have sex with him because she was just out of a 20 marriage and didn’t want to complicate her life with another relationship. But he didn’t get that and he kept pursuing her with a vengeance. I later found out from one of her office friends that she was having sex with two other men at the same time she was enjoying his physical affections, love notes and passion he showed her and told her about everyday. She probably felt sorry for him because when he first approached her to tell her he had fallen in love with her she said what about Peggy and his martyr answer was that he just didn’t know. He couldn’t abandane me. Made me out to be this helpless female that couldn’t take care of herself. That has always really pissed me off. She just wasn’t that much into him and left for another man. When he accidentally found out about the other guy through a mutual acquaintance that’s when he came crawling back to Mama, i.e., ME. If he hadn’t found out about the other guy he would still be with her. Still doesn’t help my heart from not feeling like the rebound girl or second choice. Rationally I know I should be saying, screw him, he wants her, go get her and I should have walked away. But it all came without any warning and I really did think we had the perfect marriage. I was more than totally happy with him. I went instantly into shock and really didn’t get out of it for quite a while. I think back now and my D-Day was the 24th of January and on the 4th of February I had to set up my one woman art show in the gallery and my son was coming from Perth, Australia to get married so I could be there to witness it on the 15th of February and I did all of that, but I honestly can’t tell you that I truly remember being present for any of it. And as for January, it was a complete blank. I’ve had to go back and reconstruct that month from what was going on. We were being screwed by our bank on our mortgage and that was the month that it fell through and at that time there was nothing out there to help us and it really had nothing to do with anything we were doing that caused it. Nightmare to lose my home two years later, but I was already devastated about that. My Dad had dementia and I was over at this house taking care of him almost daily that month. I had to find a helper for him because I knew I would be gone in February for the wedding in Reno. All this and more was going on right at the same time and it took me 2 years to reconstruct that month. So, there is no rational reason for any of it and he is clearly still delusional.

    • gizfield

      She sounds lovely, Peggy. Not ! She sounds like the town tramp. This is the kind of Other Woman that even OW don’t want to be identified with.

      I hope you have been tested for diseases (plural) even if they only admit to kissing because I can guarantee that mouth has had a parade of D$@ks in it. If he was messing with this lady for 10 years and he claims there was no sex, there are two possibilities. One, he is lying. Or, two, she is what we call around here, a D$@k Tease. In the latter case, a knowledgeable woman can keep a man on the string for years by withholding sex, which she is either getting elsewhere or doesn’t like. This drives men crazy thinking these broads are the best lay on the planet.

      My own idiot of a husband actually told me one day that his slut had “the highest morals of anyone he knows.” That was certainly a surprise to me, lol. I said “oh, because she won’t have sex with you?”(allegedly). He said yes, and I just started laughing right in his face. I really couldn’t help it. I said “just so you know, if she didn’t F#$k you, it’s because she didn’t WANT to”. Jesus, are they really that naive. ? Unfortunately, I think he really was. She was either banging someone on the side (she was not married) or is frigid, or maybe she thought he was really unattractive. I really think she was a d!$k Tease, in any case.

      • Peggy

        She was definitely a dick tease, but he brought it to the table. I wasn’t there, but I would bet money he started the flirting and she played along willingly. And according to him they flirted with each other for 3 years until he did the “I’m in love with you bit” and then the play got hotter.

        And yes they are that naive. In his mind she was the woman he had always been looking for. It was only one year after they had started their flirting that she actually asked him out for a drink on his birthday. She knew he was married so I think that was a test to see just how far he’d go. But he came home. Of course he never told me about it at the time, but I know it ignited him even more. They deserved each other from my stand point. I’ve told him how sorry I am that they didn’t actually have sex and get together because it wouldn’t have been any fun after a while. Eventually she would have shown her true self and he would have gotten bored or just pissed at her for flirting with other men. Ironic isn’t it? But I’ll never really know if they had sex. He swears it didn’t get to that and not because he didn’t push for it, just like your H, she couldn’t because her morals were so high:)), but when I asked him the night he revealed all this nightmare if they had and made the mistake of telling him if they had it would be a complete deal breaker for me so that may be why he has never changed his story.

        I would have laughed, too about the moral bitch. Seriously. My H used to come home and talk about what a great mother she was and a marathon runner and blah, blah, blah. It wasn’t even enough conversation about her for any flags to pop up, but I did completely trust him so I wasn’t looking.

        Yes, I have been tested and she was so moral that at 50 she was f*&king a 20 year old kid. The same age as her daughter. And another guy. Real moral and such a great mother. She was probably competing with her own daughter.

        All I know is when I met her it was 2 days after I had come back from China and been gone 6 weeks and she came up to him right in front of me and whispered in his ear while she was looking right at me and stayed there right up close to him until we left. I was so exhausted from the plane ride all I said was she’s sure friendly to you and he said, she’s a bitch and went on to tell me it pissed him off because what she was saying was that she had left the office door unlocked and wanted him to cover for her and go into work early before anyone so no one would know and the reason she couldn’t was because she had her daughter to take care of in the morning. He never said another word about her until he told me about their affair. And the other reason I didn’t even consider him with her was that he had always said that he never wanted anything to do with a blue eyed blond again because his ex-wife was that so she was the last person I would have expected him to have an affair with.

    • gizfield

      Amazingly, my husband’s skag was also a Gold Digger. These middle age hags are a dime a dozen. They thrive on attention and having some guy wanting to get in their pants. Like I said, if there are two guys you know she was sleeping with, that’s the tip of the iceberg. My husband’s high moraled whore actually spent time as a prostitute. Ugh, whenever I write stuff like this, I can hardly stop myself from reaching over and popping him upside the head for associating with such a slimy freak.

    • Rachel

      These jerks always turn to the bottom of the slime pool for their affair person.
      Just so desperate!

    • Angela

      I think a lot of the comments on this thread have gotten away from the article topic, but that is to be expected when dealing with such an emotional upheaval. Doug and Linda laid out some examples of the thoughts and behaviors typically found in a CS. I’m pasting this list here:

      I quote:
      “What are some of the behaviors and thoughts that can make one vulnerable to an affair?

      Here are several:
      •Lack of clear boundaries
      •Flirting
      •Involvement with porn
      •Using drugs and/or alcohol
      •Lack of accountability
      •Risk taking
      •Low self-esteem
      •Afraid of confrontation
      •Lack of self-control
      •Selfishness, etc.”

      I, like many BS’s have difficulty sticking to one topic because the emotions from this are so overwhelming, a BS can go completely off-subject at hand due to a constant uprising of emotions when it’s being discussed.

      I can see clearly my H didn’t establish Boundaries (I feel hurt that he didn’t reveal he was married to keep the APs attentions at bay);

      Flirting gave her a complete green-light to assume what she wanted about him, and her assumption was he was interested in her, besides his own flirting was outrageous in itself.

      Porn and Alcohol were not a factor in this event for us.

      His Lack of Accountability was nothing more than taking advantage of my very liberal policy about friendships with the opposite sex and the utter solidity of our marriage and ultra-trust we placed in each other made it possible for him to feel like he shouldn’t have had to be accountable for those behaviors, which abused our solid and pure marriage.

      Risk-taking behavior is something I have observed in him when a potential reward is at stake, and this was risk-taking. Our biggest fighting issue has been what reward he was getting out of this if not an “online girlfriend”.

      Self-esteem issues are definitely part of it and I can see how the attention of a woman 23 years younger would be flattering and ego-boosting.

      Avoiding Confrontation is one of the biggest reasons he is mistrusted. He will even lie to me if he thinks the lie will pacify me and avoid any serious probing about some action of his. Although he says he fears my angry reactions if he is truthful. To that I only say, if you are doing something that’s going to make me angry, you shouldn’t be doing it. Period.

      Lack of Self-Control comes into play in direct proportion to the size of the potential reward at stake. The bigger the possible gain, the less Self-Control is used, in my observations. Also the bigger punishment for a wrong act will push him in the right direction of Self-Control.

      Selfishness – There is definitely a factor of selfishness in every betrayal of any kind. Otherwise, betrayal wouldn’t happen. He is not, in general, a selfish person, but a low self-esteem can cause people to act in certain ways, believing they are not deserving of certain things, they will betray, show a lack of self-control, and take risks to do or gain something they otherwise feel they don’t deserve.

      In the end, it has always been and still is my opinion that a betraying spouse is the most insecure person in the relationship. Illicit relationships give them a self-esteem boost they are otherwise lacking, no matter how much their spouse loves them.

      I still find it amazing that a person of my confidence level and intelligence and accomplishments could be brought to my knees from this devastation. It is almost as if the other person has taken off their “Low Esteem” mask and made me wear it instead.

    • Rachel

      Angela,
      We often get off topic on this site. Some days we don’t get on topic.
      We kind of just talk about whatever is on our mind.

      • Angela

        Yep, guilty of that myself. When I came back to re-read this article, I realized that I started posting about the topic, but ended up in left field with my first post, so I made another attempt to stick to the topic of the article. BS’s are so traumatized, one idea or suggestion can send them in a thousand directions. My first posts (2 of them) are near the top of the article. My last one was an attempt to actually use the article as a guideline to work out some thoughts. I’m so glad Doug & Linda put their own personal pain out there for the world to see and sacrificed their own privacy to help others. Don’t know what I’d have done without this site. All the other sound like they were written by a student working on a dissertation.

    • gizfield

      Rachel, glad you made it through the blizzard!

      I view the topics as a general “guideline” myself myself and write pretty much whatever comes to mind. If I waited till the topic was a certain thing I’d never get anything written, lol.

      • Peggy

        Angela, your list is right on, of course. My H had low self-esteem, risk taker, need for a high he hadn’t got since he quit drinking and his big one has always been fear of confrontation. I used to joke with him when “Everyone Loves Raymond” was on TV and say everyone loves St—-n because everyone did. He would say or do anything he could to avoid any kind of confrontation. And look at the confrontation they all got themselves into now. What I found out when the confrontation started with us was that he has seriously passive aggressive and it all came out then. He’s working on these issues now, but he didn’t really start facing anything until 6 months ago. It’s been four years of hell for me.

    • Rachel

      Yes giz, the blizzard dumped about 25+ inches of lovely white snow!!!! And now they ate predicting another storm for Monday!!!!
      The ex took my snowblower so sidewalks won’t be cleared until spring for me.
      Ya see it’s just another F-U to me because his mommy hires someone to plow and they already have a snow blower.
      I would love to email him and give him a piece of my mind, but he will love that so my fingers won’t be doing any typing to him.
      Heading to the movies and dinner tonight with my new man.
      I have never been to so many restaurants before with the sperm donor in the 25 years that I was married to him!!!!
      Our discussions at dinner are always good, no arguments and he looks into my eyes not the waitress breasts. Peace at last!!!

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