Most of us think that an affair happens only one way. One partner has a sexual relationship with another person outside of their marriage. This is usually the only type of affair people think about. But, way back in January when I took my road trip for my birthday and meet with the lady in Jerome, she told me that #3 was not faithful to me. I immediately told her she was wrong that he did not have an affair that I would (god, I hoped) be able to tell. She told me “Affairs are not just sexual, think outside the box.” I put the thought out of my head because I already hated him enough; I did not need any more fuel to toss on the fire of hate. But, now that I am ready to start allowing a man into my life, I am really spending time focusing on what went wrong in past relationships both on my part and their part. I want to make sure that I do not repeat mistakes that I have done and I want to be able to see mistakes that they are doing so that it can be addressed right away.
So the last few weeks I have been thinking about what she said. If he was unfaithful to me but not sexually then how was he unfaithful to me? One of the things both of us did towards the end of the marriage was have not only separate friends but separate social lives as well. He had a group of friends that he liked to spend time with doing what he liked, hiking, camping, being outdoors etc. These are all things I hate and have no desire to do. Me on the other hand had friends that got together for more spiritual discussions on every topic from psychics to ghosts to the after life. These are things he is interested in but always felt he was on a higher level that I was and any type of conversation we had was more of a lecture and I was always accused of not wanting to participate in the conversation.
Anyway, so this is where our extra-marital affairs started. He went looking for friends who did things he enjoyed and spending time with them. Me I went looking for friends that I could enjoy spending time with. One thing leads to another and he was writing his books and using me as a secretary. It may have been fun bonding for him but it was agonizing work for me. So we are pulled farther and farther apart. But as people we still need the basic things and as a couple we still have things we need from each other. But as we drift apart the other person is no longer available to offer even the simplest of basic needs to their partner.
When I was down he was not there to help pick me up so I turned to friends. If I was sick he was not there to make me feel better so I turned to other people. When I was looking for companionship he was never available or I had to listen to him complain about money, not losing 5 pounds, he had a zit and could not be seen all these things that were nothing more than excuses not to be with me. So when he says our marriage was over before May of 2007 he is very correct. Our marriage ended the day we started turning to other people because we could not get what we needed from each other. So even though we were sexual faithful (again, I hope he was) we were not emotional faithful, friends faithful nor compassion faithful.
I think that before I can get into any relationship with a man I have to learn to not only be completely 100% faithful myself but when things start to change and turn I need to be able to see it, confront it and demand that it change. Affairs, no matter what kind they are, are deadly to a relationship. The day you realize you cannot turn to your spouse for the simplest and basic of needs is the day you need to either wake up and fix it or walk away. Hopefully, next time I will be able to do that before I get my heart broken.
Posted by
Cynthia