We all have friends or confidants that we enjoy talking to. We call them after a bad day; we call them after a good day. We may get together with them once or twice a week to just hang out and have a cup of coffee and a chat about all the things that are wrong or right that day. We need these friendships and those friendships sustain is in the workplace, while we are volunteering, outside of our kids activities as we swap stories in the 45 minutes or so we have to stand around and wait.
But when we begin to become more and intimate in our communications, beyond that looking for a shoulder or a friendly ear, when we turn to these people or person (rather than go to our spouse) that can be a problem. Seeking your emotional fulfillment from other people beyond your spouse is how emotional affairs begin.
Emotional Affairs Are a Form of Infidelity
Not all emotional affairs become physical, but many of them have their start there. You are looking at another person for something you are not getting from your spouse. It can be as simple as having someone share an interest that your spouse doesn’t and you do. It can begin with two people going to the movies because they both like going to the movies, but the spouse doesn’t really have a lot of interest in it. Soon – you are spending a regular date every week with this other person.
Maybe dinner happens or coffee afterwards or a drink and maybe you talk on the phone regularly because you can really talk to this person the way you can’t talk to your spouse. This is the danger zone, because affairs aren’t just about sex. They are about craving attention, connection and intimacy. You don’t have to have sex to get these things from another person and the more you get that need fulfilled by someone who isn’t your spouse – the greater danger your marriage is.
After all, chances are that’s how you and your spouse began your friendship, relationship and marriage. You shared a common interest, you enjoyed spending time together and you could talk to each other about things you couldn’t talk to anyone else about – do you see the danger?
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