emotional affairThis post was written by Sara K.

With all our talk and thoughts about indiscretions and infidelities it can often be hard to realize when a new line has been crossed. During the healing period both members of the couple are sensitive and even the smallest infraction can lead to emotional distress.

About 2 years post-infidelity my best friend Tami’s husband Dave decided to take an adult band class. He has always loved to play guitar and thought this was an opportunity to do something positive for himself after working so hard to put his marriage back together.

Tami while thinking it was a silly mid-life crisis sort of thing, went along with the plan knowing Dave really was becoming a loving and committed man and deserved a break a few hours a week.

So, what was Tami to think when she did her random email check from her husband and found the following?

“Band is awesome. Don’t you love it? Wish I could play guitar like you. You’re unbelievable.”

Her name was Stephanie. She was one of only 2 women in the seven-piece band. Tami knew that David spent 2 hours a week at this class and that there were two women and five men. But, when she read that one little note her heart skipped a beat. What didn’t she know? She frantically searched Dave’s email for more messages. But, there weren’t any.

Calmly she approached Dave. But, as she stepped further down each stair towards him she felt the fear take over. By the time she reached the kitchen table where Dave was drinking his morning coffee she ripped into him. Of course, a fight ensued.

See also  Emotional Affair Signs

Dave didn’t show the email to her because to him it was no big deal. “Don’t you know flirting when you see it?” Tami replied. This went back and forth with silent treatment followed by yelling and silence again for two days. Tami finally called me to vent.

Fear Can Make Us Crazy

Not that I know more about life than Tami, but I am one year ‘ahead’ of her in our post-infidelity phase.  As post- emotional affair, cheating or whatever you want to call it – we do often get nervous about relapse or watching our spouse hurt us all over again. Some women even live in fear for a long time. Some forever. But, eventually, hopefully the trust is earned back. Tami and I decided to look at the facts:

Exhibit A: Dave didn’t respond to that email. It was over a week old.

Exhibit B: Dave hadn’t done anything in the past two years but go to therapy and try to be open through building trust.

Exhibit C: Tami was now filled with guilt. Dave hadn’t really done anything wrong here.

When fear takes over and we lose sight of reality it’s impossible to feel the trust. But, the fact remains men and women are always going to be around one another, interacting: at work, the gym, the grocery store – everywhere.  Our goal, hard as it is, is not to babysit.

We have to be able to find a common ground, a way to understand that not every male- female interaction means cheating.

See also  A Marital Affair Can Get Real Serious Real Fast

After an affair or infidelity it is imperative that both spouses understand marriage is an open book. There are no secrets. If I feel like checking emails, or texts I can. My husband knows this and respects this as part of our rebuilding of trust.

In fact, when I check and find nothing it only makes me trust him more. As our healing continues I check rarely, if at all. I also try to remember that although it’s a hard pill to swallow, if a woman complements my husband or even flirts with him it’s how he responds (or doesn’t) that counts.

Tami and Dave made up that night. She asked Dave to share those types of emails in the future just so she wouldn’t have to stumble across anything and make assumptions. Dave, of course, complied.

When I shared this whole story with my own husband it reminded me to once in a while appreciate the hard work he’s putting in to our marriage. Honesty and trust are always at the forefront but I know personally how hard it can be to see something that could be more than meets the eye.

To protect ourselves so we don’t get ‘duped’ again, tricked or miss any cue that could lead us down that road to hurt we are always on the lookout. But, sometimes our vigilance plays its own tricks on us healing victims of infidelity and truly there isn’t more than meets the eye.

Have you ever stumbled on something that you thought was more and turned out to be nothing? Does fear sometimes make you paranoid? How do you deal with that reality?

 

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    26 replies to "When it Isn’t an Emotional Affair"

    • exercisegrace

      Very good article Sara!! I have found myself in a similar situation. It is a delicate line to walk. Within months of D-day, we had two instances where I felt a couple of new acquaintances were pushing the boundary with my husband. Clearly in the above email, while I agree it is NOT an emotional affair, it IS an invitation to further the friendship and that is how EA’s start. A casual email or two, then texting, then looking forward “too” much to seeing that other person, then lingering after practice, going out for coffee. So easy to slide down that slope. Lack of healthy, definable boundaries is what go my husband into a full blown EA/PA. He is much more aware now, and when something like that email crops up, he tells me right away and seeks my opinion on how to handle certain situations. It certainly helps to have open communication about these situations (and the same goes for me as well). Our counselor said that for now, our boundaries need to be very, very tight. As trust and security build, they will likely move a bit. But to be honest? There are certain things I will NEVER be comfortable with, ever again. Things I would not have batted an eye at BEFORE his affair.

    • Natalia

      This post hit home. A few weeks ago, while on vacation, he got a call on his cell phone from a woman related to work. I was furious, not because she called, but because she called his cell phone and it proved he had lied to me. In the past, he would “boast” that he NEVER gave anyone his cell phone number nor did he answer calls from unknown numbers. However, this time he did the right thing and told her he was on vacation with his family and that she should call his office on Monday. I only wish he would have been straight forward and said “Please don’t call this number again. Call my office from now on.”

      As to the questions Have you ever stumbled on something that you thought was more and turned out to be nothing? I probably have, many times. But I confront him and he is more than willing to explain. Which helps the healing process tremendously and helps me be less vigilant because being on alert all the time is too damaging for me. Does fear sometimes make you paranoid? Yes and sometimes it even puts me right back to D-day and brings back all the anger I’ve tried so hard to get rid of. Angry at having been so stupidly trusting and angry at him for having taken advantage of my trust. However, I’ve had access to all his emails (even work) and FB account since D-day and he’s honest about the way he responds to the other women (who, unfortunately, he still works with) because he knows that his responses WILL DETERMINE IF OUR RELATIONSHIP SURVIVES. How do you deal with that reality? I deal with it by talking to him. By asking questions and expressing my fears. He’s been very good at answering and listening to me every single time. I have only one regret and that is THINKING he knew what boundaries meant without me having to SPELL them out. He’s not a child but surely behaved as one and I refused to baby-sit him. Even today. Maybe I should have been a BITCH and “pulled that leash tight” so he wouldn’t dare hurt me.

    • Natalia

      I forgot to mention that even though I have access to all his emails and FB, he tells me as soon as someone contacts him. This keeps communication open even though I still have to get used to it.

    • Mandy

      My problem was just the opposite. I saw some things and, because I had always trusted my husband totally, thought they were less than they really were. Now, post-affair, I am often paranoid. My husband understands this and forwards me any emails that might be questionable or tells me about phone calls.

      Like Natalia, I simply assumed he knew what the boundaries were. They seemed like common sense to me. Now I know better, so I have spelled them out and occasionally I ask him, “What would you do if….” I suppose in some ways it is treating him like a child, but it is an education he needs.

      • Natalia

        My H has always crossed boundaries because that’s the only way he knows how to relate to women in general. He can find out anything from any women in just one conversation. I too saw the signs early on and ignored them cause I never in a million years would have considered that cheating until he started “forgetting” to mention things about other women and later they would slip and he’d act like he had already mentioned it and when I found old emails with flirty comments I finally understood what an emotional affair was.

    • forcryin'outloud

      It is all about boundaries. My husband crossed those lines numerous times before the EA but I would let it slide because I was confident in who we were and who I was. In hindsight it was ludacris how trusting I was. “Ain’t that way no more.”
      A crazy thing, we were in therapy shortly after d-day and he was once again crossing boundaries with a women. Nothing on the lines of an EA but taking a little too much interest in a co-worker’s baby-making problems…and isn’t that how it all begins. We sat in therapy and I told the therapist if he keeps this up eventually someone is going to wind up on our front door “bunny boiler” style. He said he thought that was far fetched. The therapist chuckled and told him she could tell him 100+ stories of such events and that if he kept it up, that yes, he was headed down that path. He was astonished! I told him he was lucky the meth addict/alcoholic husband of his OW hadn’t shown up. The rest of the session was spent educating him on boundaries and evaluating his definition of commitment.
      I have since learned of a few more boundary teetering relationships that existed prior to d-day. (In all toll I would say there has been 7 over 25 yrs.) Every time it just pushes the healing process backward. And like Natalie I wish early on, even before marriage, I would have drop the ax on his bad-habit! The funny thing is there was a 10 yr period when none of this boundary junk was an issue.

      • Natalia

        This is one of the many examples of how good my H is at crossing boundaries. We used to live in an apartment building about 25 years ago. One day he told me he had met a girl in the elevator who was from Russia named Alina, 25 years old, lived with her older sister, both were single and both worked in Saks. This might not seem odd until you realize that she lived in the 7th floor and we lived in the 5th floor. It took him a 5 story flight down the elevator to get all this information! Did I think this was odd or that he was crossing boundaries? Nope! I thought it was just the way he was. But now I wonder if he got this information in the elevator or somewhere else, such as her apartment! No point in going back, I’m moving forward everyday and I’m not ignoring any of his stupid behavior again.

    • DJ

      I had something happen recently. It showed my husband that even though we are more than two years out from discovery of his affair, my insecurities and fears will flare up in an instant if given suspicious event.

      It was 11:45pm and he had fallen asleep on the couch. I was sitting next to him reading. His phone rang. I thought it must be an important call from someone in his family – who else would call at that hour? I went to pick up his phone to bring it to him and saw that it was a blocked call. My insecurities all woke up and stood at attention. I didn’t answer. Who could that be?

      I took the phone and put it down on the coffee table in front of him but didn’t wake him. I sat there for a good 5 minutes, staring at the stupid phone, my insecurities getting the best of me. Finally I stood up and decided it was time for a complete check up. I took the phone and scoured it for evidence of infidelity. It was clean. Then I went to his laptop and scoured it, too. It was clean, too.

      I did find that “their” song was still in his music file. That caused my stomach to tighten up in knots. I had asked him to delete it several times. So I deleted it myself. There is still other music that they shared with each other, but I left those for him to do himself.

      He had gotten up and was fuming silently on the couch while he waited for me to finish checking his computer. He doesn’t try to stop me but he always gets angry when I check. He says I should trust him already. I told him the song was still there so I had deleted it myself. I told him I never wanted that song in our lives in any way at any time. He was still silent – so unusual – and he stormed off to bed.

      When I got to bed he said that I was being unfair to him. He asked if I had found anything on his computer besides the music. I said no. He said the music was old news and he didn’t delete them because he never listens to music on his computer. I asked why he had so much music on his computer then? He had no answer.

      I apologized for getting angry. I said: “I know you’re not doing anything wrong now and your computer is clean and the phone records are clean and I’m not getting any weird vibes that you’re lying to me. But you should have cleaned out your music files. You know very well what that song does to me. This is the third trigger I have encountered in three days and I can’t handle it. And you want to talk about being fair? How is it fair that I have to live with this? I did not choose this life. I did not have any say, no chance to be involved, in what was happening in MY life. My heart and my life were ripped to shreds. I am doing well at putting it back together again. I am fine most of the time and I don’t mention my pain much to you, but I have to live with it in my heart every day. Was that fair to me?… The only Fair you have the right to worry about now is Fair for our marriage. That means you help me heal. Helping me heal means talking about it with me. This here right now is totally fair. And you’d be surprised but this will help you heal, too. Your anger shows me you’re not healed at all.”

      He said nothing. We lay there in bed with me softly crying for some time. When I was able to stop, I turned to him and said, “I still love you, you know.” He grabbed me and wrapped me up in his arms and said he loved me, too. We fell asleep holding each other and got up that way, too. It was not good for my knee but we felt connected to one another again.

      It turned out that it really had been his older brother on the phone. He is in a foreign country and the phone card he was using was listed as blocked. The other cards he uses show up as unknown, so I didn’t think it would be him.

      We are fine most of the time these days. Life is almost normal in many ways. But a trigger like a blocked call late at night can still send me over the edge in fear and insecurity. Still, if that song hadn’t still been there, it would have been ok once I checked. But it was like a double whammy and I fell.

      • Natalia

        Dj, the next time his phone rings and you happen to be the closest one to it, go ahead and answer it. He shouldn’t even think of getting angry because things are different now. You should demand total transparency. As to deleting that song, you did the right thing. If he doesn’t care to delete them then he’s not feeling your pain. So go ahead and delete all those trigger songs and do it in his presence to show him you mean business and he needs to “get it” once and for all. After my D-day I asked my H to delete the contacts if the OW from his email accounts, Facebook and his phone. A week later everything was still there. His excuse was that he didn’t have time and he didn’t think it was necessary cause he wasn’t going to use any contact anyway. I told him that when I asked him to do something for me he was to do it immediately and since he didn’t care about how I felt knowing it was there then I was going to do it myself. And I did. He didn’t say anything and didn’t stop me either. I also told him that from now on things were different and was going to demand respect. Today things are very different and he says he’ll do anything to protect my heart.

    • Rachel

      I need some opinion. My ex and his mother are asking my boys separately how I’m doing. Both answered ” she doing fine”.
      I’m not sure about this answer. Do they think, oh she’s fine she really didn’t love him anyways. I’m not doing fine, I’m just doing. Day by day. My youngest said you are doing fine, your strong. I guess I hide the pain well. I do cry often but hide it. No reason to get them upset. They’ve been through this hell long enough.
      I told my son what other choice do I have?

      • Natalia

        Rachel, tell your sons the truth. You’re doing fine because you need to move on. He made a choice and it wasn’t you. Even though you loved him it’s time to heal and hanging on to his betrayal is damaging to your life. You need to move on in order to help your sons develop a better relationship with their father. And since you have children in common you need to be strong to be able to (in the future) talk to him in a civilized manner. For your sake and theirs. No one should even think you didn’t love him because you didn’t cheat when you were unhappy. Hang in there. Hope I said something you can use. I have to thank you for pointing out what a narcissist is. My husband did a 180 after he read that article you posted.

        • Doug

          Hey Natalia, I hate to hijack things here, but I can’t find the comment where Rachel posted an article on narcissism. Can you post or email me the link as it might be a good article to post on the blog sometime. Thanks!

          • Natalia

            Hi Doug! Rachel posted it on 7/31/12 in “What is Commitment in a Marriage” (7/26/12):

            http://www.lisaescott.com/2011/03/17/why-narcissist-inevitably-devalues-discards-dd-you

            And I mentioned it on 10/22/12 in “Life after Infidelity”
            Like I said before, up until the day I read the link my H and I had been moving forward in our healing process at a slow pace. Perhaps too slow for me since he was still coming out of the EA fog. But once he read it he took a giant leap forward and made a total exit from the fog into my world. He understood what he had been doing to me and us for so long and immediately stopped being an a**h**! I can never thank Rachel enough 🙂

            • Doug

              Thanks Natalia. I just wasn’t going back far enough to look. It’s great that the article helped you guys so much. I’ll check it out. Thanks again.

      • tryinghard

        Rachel
        I agree with Natalia. I think you should tell your sons that you are sad that your relationship with their father is ending because you love him so much and wanted to spend your life with him. That there is nothing “fine” or easy about going through a divorce. I wouldn’t go too deep but I think it is a big mistake to say you are fine. They know you are hiding your true feelings and that will make them think they have to hide their’s from you. Why should they open up if you don’t type of thinking. They want to protect you. They don’t have the words or experience to tell the G’Ma that they think you are not fine. Maybe also they think they are saying what G’ma wants to hear.

      • exercisegrace

        I agree with everyone else. Be as honest as you can with your boys, at an age-appropriate level. During my husband’s affair, my daughter (then mid teen) became very angry with me and admits now she hated me for a time, because she felt like I was “letting” her dad get away with what was going on. I actually did “too good” of a job of keeping my feelings under wraps. Our arguments about my suspicions all took place behind closed doors, and she thought I didn’t care!

        I would also consider a politely worded comment or email to both your ex and his mother. I would say something along the lines of …..thank you for your concern for me, and please feel free to call me or email if you have questions. However, it stresses the boys out and places undue pressure on them when you put them in the middle and essentially ask them to monitor how I am doing.

        Blessings friend, you are in my prayers.

    • Sara K

      Rachel,

      I’m not sure how old your sons are, but I know with my 16 year old the house could be on fire and he’d say we were ‘fine’. That’s code speak for I don’t want to talk about my personal family feelings with you. I wouldn’t put too much emphasis on that. Kids internalize a lot and this is a big bucket of worry to worry about their mom – they may just not want to share anything at all…

    • tryinghard

      Good Post. Innocent as the email/text may have been it is inappropriate to do that with a married person. This is how it starts as “friends”, “we have so much in common” blah, blah, blah and the beat goes on. He did the best thing by not responding BUT I would like to know how and why she had his number/email address? Cheaters are like alcoholics. Alcoholics don’t go with people who drink, they don’t go to bars, they do everything to stay out of the way of temptation. Cheaters have a weakness that takes many years to go away. I would bet when he got that email he got a certain thrill. OK he may not have acted on it but the thrill was still there. He knew what she was doing. What were her motives in sending him such a “innocent” text when if she really thought he was a good guitarist she could have easily said in class “..WOW you are really good” and then moved on.
      Yes we do go into “high alert” and he are now conditioned to do so. This is just some of the fallout that we all, CS and BS have to live with probably forever.
      I am interested in knowing more about a list of boundaries that was mentioned. I know the obvious, but is there a list somewhere? I have drawn the line for my H and boy does it raise his hackles. He asks if I am threatening him and I say no I am promising him!

      • exercisegrace

        Well said. Contacting someone PRIVATELY. Contacting someone OUTSIDE of the setting in which you normally see them is inappropriate. Period. If either person is married, it is crossing a boundary. So many people want to think they are “above” such petty emotions like jealousy. And they have no idea that jealousy can be HEALTHY in a relationship. It can serve as an early warning signal to trouble. It can raise a red flag when someone is trying to push a relationship to the next level. My question would be….so what that he didn’t answer it in a week? Why didn’t he delete it? Mention it to his spouse? I will even go so far as to say that I think there is NOTHING wrong with saying to someone…. “I’m sorry, I don’t have private communications with members of the opposite sex. That’s just a protective boundary we have in our marriage. Thank you for respecting that.”
        and if the person truly had no ill intent, they will not be offended by that. If they did have intentions of fishing for more of a relationship, well you have nipped that in the bud!!!

    • D

      I read somewhere a woman saying, “I could never have an affair because the first thing I would want to do is tell my husband about it.”

      The email was not an EA, but clearly Tami’s husband has some work to do. I don’t think anything in relationships is as important as communication. And as innocent as the email may appear – it was a week old, not responded to, etc – the fact that the husband chose to keep its existence quiet shows at the least a lack of sensitivity, but more specifically it also reveals a hint of secrecy, even if only subconsciously.

      Clearly, the relationship in class got to the point where email addresses are exchanged, where egos are being stroked, where an attempt at a connection (on her part) is being made. In secrecy is where affairs thrive. What better assurity could be made to Tami that there was nothing to the email than to bring it out into the open – full disclosure.

      Am I being paranoid? Privacy is also important to one’s individuality. But I sort of feel that until healing is fully achieved, the cheating spouse should agree to forfeit that privacy. And, frankly, if they’re truly invested in the marriage, it’s very small gesture that provides an enormous payback.

    • CBB

      I agree, this one e-mail might not be an EA but Me as a woman would never have mailed this without any feeling of “special connection”. I think we all know this is asking for connection, flirting- maybe the introduction to-, and before my H’s EA he and I would have probably seen it as flatering his ego. It’s his responce that would let it evolve but if she knew he was married to me she is already crossing the line and it doesn’t have anything to do with my paranoia. I live in a man’s world and I know they give the same kind of flirty remarks all the time but even before he EA I always responded unoffended but not going with the flow. Maybe I sense it more then others. Maybe my H doesn’t define those bounderies well because I find my MIL crossing them all the time (not more than this e-mail, not only in a sexual way, just crossing other peoples private bounderies as if she needs to prove how close a friend she is) It makes it very hard for me to discuss bounderies with my H.

    • Symac

      Is it really possible, no, scratch that, realistic to have an EA and it not be physical? My husband has lied to me pretty one since day one of our marriage – porn, strip clubs, debt, spending, and 3 years ago he got a job out of town, which, you guessed it, meant lots of overnight stays out of town. In my naivety I trusted and didnt think to check out the phone bills – which showed calls and text ALL hours of the day and night, two number frequently showed up which were his EA’s (co-workers) but then other numbers showed up too. Apparently he was ok with sharing his number with women he’d meet at bars, you know, so he’d have company to party with. Of course I knew NONE of this as I was busy at home raising our baby who was born the year the new job started. Well, DDay was this past December 7. Found some pics on his phone that EA 2 sent to him “modeling” her underpants (sadly I am more familiar with her than I care to be – and her “toys”). My husband even lied when I found them, saying that it was some woman at work sending out random pics to all the people in the office… and like everything else, he eventually came clean about it too, after hours and days of trickle. In spite of everything, the time frame, the opportunity, he SWEARS he has never had any physical contact with anyone. Not that it matters, after much wrestling and trying to make it work, especially for the sake of our child, I just cannot move forward. That burning in my stomach rages all day and night, and I “know” he is lying still. It’s hard to fathom divorcing, but I cannot stay with someone I don’t trust. I know he will never be 100% straight with me, so I was hoping maybe someone here who has had EA’s and opportunity can attest as to whether or not it’s realistic that the EA’s never turned into PA’s.

      • tryinghard

        Symac
        Personally I think they are lying saying it was just an EA. I also believe if it’s not a one night stand a PA is also and EA. Just from what you’ve written my gut says he’s lying. If you can move on without too much pain, do it. Sounds like he has LOTS of issues. What am I saying, they all do. This not the first PA/EA for my H. They were 30 years apart. It’s true, once a cheater, always a cheater! Listen to your gut and if you have the money, hire a PI. Good Luck

    • Symac

      Hi and thanks, Tryinghard.
      I texted EA2 and she said nothing physical happened, but this EA was about 3 or 4 months long. The other, which was about 18 months in length, she refuses to talk to me. Claims I have the “wrong number”. I find that curious, that she refuses to even acknowledge the situation. I mean, if it was just words and talk, why not just say so? The divorce is going to happen to there is no reason for a PI or anything. He is showing remorse, going to counseling, treated me a crapload better in the past 2 months than EVER in our entire marriage, buuuuuuut………. that gnawing feeling will not cease. Every time I feel some peace, the internal alarm goes off, I start analyzing phone records, text message records, hotel stays…. and it feels wrong. It’s like I have all these puzzle pieces but no picture to know where they all belong. Anyway, I am now wrestling with the humiliation of having to contact my doctor for a complete STD test, and he is still sticking to his guns.

    • tryinghard

      Symac
      Good for you! Yes I had to do the STD test TWICE!!! I was so proud 🙁

      I have those very same feelings in case you didn’t see my comment on the latest post. Good don’t spend any money on the PI if you have all the info you need to make a good decision for yourself. I wish I were as brave as you. I don’t know how to live by myself. Never have done it. While I still love my H I love my life too and I know he loves his life and that I am just part of the whole package. Keep loving yourself and your values and do what you need to do and what will make you satisfied.

    • Symac

      It’s really interesting because when I tell him I am going to file and list adultery as the reason, he says he won’t fight it, even though he could and I don’t have enough evidence to prove it went sexual. I don’t understand why anyone would just go along with that accusation if it wasn’t true. If the roles were reversed I would tell the judge that yes, there were words, pictures and social outings but I would deny up and down that I EVER had sex with someone else if I knew I didn’t. I HATE him for putting me in this position. I hate not knowing the truth, and, like you, I don’t know how to live alone either. I went from my home to his (got married in my very early 20’s). It scares the daylights out of me, but what other option is there. His parents know about the affairs, but mine do not. His parents side with me, but pleaded that I try and save the marriage. I have tried, but it feels like the dinners and weekend escapes are just distractions from the truth. It seems like every time I dig just a little, a whole bunch of crap comes out, and then he plays his little word games of “Well, when you asked if I went out to dinner with Leanne, I thought you meant as a date”, when they question I asked was “Have you taken her out to dinner?” (which he did but swears was in a social setting with other co-workers…BTW this was admitted ONLY after I discovered the text message where she asked him if she though someone had seen them and would he tell their boss. Why would anyone have to “tell” anything if there were a bunch of people present?). As I read what I type, the answer is obvious. I guess there is a part of me that wants to believe it never was a PA, that maybe I could work with that little shred of hope. Ugh, this sucks! Someone elses crappy decisions have put ME in the position of making the tough calls. He, of course, wants to work it out. Yes, of course he would. He got to have his flings, play “Mr-Single-and-ready-to-mingle” when he was out of town and then come home to the security of a wife and family. Jerk. lol.

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