I am having a flood of clients coming in to discuss details regarding their affair. It never seizes to amaze me how powerful our hormones are in the throws of passion. The endorphins that surge throughout the body during the initial stages of lust often cloud judgment and rationale. The details vary, the names are different, but the storyline is very much the same.
“I never meant for this to happen.”
“I am so confused because it feels so right.”
“This is not your typical affair, we are different, we are meant to be together.”
Every time I hear these claims, my heart breaks because they are in the haze and unable to see all the ramifications that come along with an affair.
Part of my job as a MHP (mental health practitioner) is to educated the clients about the consequences and also ask them the tough questions they are unwilling to ask themselves.
These are just a few things I ask my clients to consider before having an affair:
1. It is easy to blame your partner. Almost everyone tries to justify his or her actions by using the blame game. They blame their partners for not communicating, for making them feel lonely, and for not understanding what they need.
2. You don’t realize what you have done until after the fact. It is not until you have crossed the line from friendly flirting to a full on physical affair do you finally grasp that you are at risk of losing everything.
3. You will always have to look over your shoulder and worry. Did you remember to log out of your email account? You will obsess over your cell phone and panic if you leave it out where your partner can see. You will stress about phone calls from your lover, seeing your lover in public when you are with your family, and coworkers finding out. You will second-guess if you are acting strange to your partner. Are you being too happy, are you not being affectionate enough, and will your partner suspect. Are you spending too much money on clothes? Are you dressing too sexy? Do you spell different after you are with your lover? The questions and worrying will consume your every thought.
4. The guilt will threaten to swallow you whole. Even when you can’t be with your children (they are at school or otherwise occupied) when you are with your lover you will feel as though you are missing out on valuable time with your kids. Even if you are not a parent the guilt will be all consuming because you’re actions and choices don’t line up with your values and morals. After all you did make promises, vows in front of God, family and friends.
5. The intense passion that you feel when you are with your lover will eventually fade (this is often a hard pill to swallow, but facts are facts). The secret itself is so intoxicating and sexy it makes the union feel euphoric; however, in time it will be this secrecy that leads you to feel isolated. You will cut off your friends, your family, your coworkers in order to keep this secret and then there will come a time when you want to tell someone about your lover or talk about the affair, but you can’t because the risk is too big. You will inevitably feel alone amongst all the excitement.
6. You will start to question your lover’s loyalty. After all, they cheated with you what’s to say they won’t cheat with another? And another?
7. This will lead to the demise of the illusion. Your lover will eventually pop the “perfect” bubble or crash off of the pedestal you put him on. You will come to realize he is lazy or a workaholic, you will reach out and he will turn away. The pain you feel from this awareness will be so intense because you have tricked yourself into believing he was perfect, that he was worth the risk of being caught, or worth leaving your family and your life for.
8. At some point one of you will want different things. You may want to leave and he threatens to out the affair. Leading you to make promises you can’t keep or spending more time on him, which you can’t maintain. Or he may accuse of you being too needy and you find yourself trying to adjust for him all the while staying covert from your spouse. You will suffer in silence. This is when it will get super messy and very stressful.
9. You will lose sleep. You are wound tight throughout the day you will find it impossible to slow your mind at night. You will be retracing your steps making sure you didn’t charge a room on the wrong card, leave a meal receipt in your coat pocket. It will never end and what started as a fun escape turns into this constant state of stress and mess.
10. If you are found out and your marriage ends or you hurt the one you truly love, you will have regrets. You will regret the way you handled yourself that you gave into temptation, that you didn’t just go to your partner or appreciate what you had. You will regret the tarnished image your children have of you.
It is important that you consider what I laid out for you. Trust me when I say, it is no different than any other dirty little transgression. If you don’t believe me maybe a statistic can influence your decision, 95-97% of relationships that start as an affair end… The odds are stacked against you. Affairs seem perfect because they are a fantasy. Real life stress does not enter your hotel room or your sweet talks of what the future holds. Enter in a mortgage payment, stressful jobs, screaming kids, money problems, sickness and disease and see how well your lover fairs… Anyone can inject themselves into someone’s life and promise grand things when they are not truly invested. It takes a real partner to sign on the dotted line, share in the household chores, change the baby in the middle of the night, or care for your aging parent. It takes a real partner to be here day in and day out no matter the circumstances. Remember that every relationship will become mundane and weighed down with stress and annoyances. Consider these things when weighing out whether or not to begin an affair.