Are affairs super common?

[User5512]

Every other joke is about 🙄 affairs! Are affairs that common? I thought something like this would be scandalous in my friendship circles, but I heard the other day about a someone I know breaking up with her good friend as she developed feelings for the husband 😳They are 40 ffs !!

Sure, sex is important to lots of people. Marriage vows are also important to lots of people. I’m glad I’m married to someone who knows me inside out (and vice versa) and who respects me enough not to shag around during the times my libido has been affected by pregnancy/new motherhood/mental illness/medication/bereavement/menopause. Likewise, his libido has been affected at times by health issues/medication/mental health. Rather than being led by our base urges into situations which would hurt the other person and our children, we have done what grown-ups do and talked to each other about the situation.

Yes, may be a year of abstinence, but no more than that, everyone would be so much happier if they accepted that affairs are inevitable in this situation.

I wish everyone could be honest.

non-monogamy would be fine as long as it’s discussed.
The lying is where the betrayal comes in.

And although not condoning an affair in a sexless relationship - the first course of action should be discussion - what about where it isn’t sexless?

I don’t ask but the men often volunteer that info!

Yes

Well all you’re saying here is that for you a year of abstinence is acceptable but no more than that. You’ll be aware I’m sure that you don’t speak for other people. Some of us in happy marriages are able to manage these conversations ourselves and don’t need to defer to your arbitrary timescale.

Affairs are certainly not inevitable. Communication is essential.

@youngones1 lol at the idea of an arbitrary time limit 🤣

Of course sex is important - nobody is doubting that! If there’s a problem with sex within a relationship, there needs to be open communication about it. If one or both parties decides it’s an insurmountable problem, they’re free to leave the relationship and can do so without being dishonest about anything. Refusing to face the issue and shagging someone else instead is a coward’s reaction.

And it’s all quite the red herring anyway since many of the people who post on MN saying that their partner has had sex with someone else weren’t in fact in a sexless relationship.

Do you use protection with him? If not you're assisting this man with removing true consent from his wife's choices when she decides to have sex with her husband. You never know they might e married because the implication that marriage equates to a private and exclusive sex life with her husband appealed appealed her and you are a part of this not being true. Does it bother you at all that when she is having sex with him he's been with you potentially on the same day?

I appreciate a year is an arbitrary timescale, my point is that for some being in a sexless marriage is unbearable and they will look for intimacy elsewhere in the hope of not getting caught so that the marriage continues. The alternative of having the talk could mean the marriage there and then.

If you clamped your legs shut @Ameliasdragon, would he still be with you?
🤔
I think not.

The thing is many people think this until they find out otherwise. I'm not saying it's the case in your marriage but so many people when they find out their partner has cheated says 'they were the last person you'd have ever expected'

Wow so mature

Everyone would be happier if people had a conversation rather than seeking an affair.

i wouldn’t want to live without sex. That’s not a free pass to lie to your partner. If you want sex that much you are willing to lie, manipulate and betray your partner because sex is so important. Leave.

for some being in a sexless marriage is unbearable and they will look for intimacy elsewhere in the hope of not getting caught so that the marriage continues

The alternative of having the talk could mean the marriage there and then.

So what you’re saying is that some people who are in a sexless relationship are not prepared to discuss the problem with their partner and will instead have sex with someone else. I mean that’s just shitty behaviour isn’t it? (Your earlier posts implied that having an affair might be justifiable in a relationship where there is a lack of intimacy).

I notice you also haven’t responded to the suggestion that actually many people shagging other people aren’t in fact in sexless relationships in the first place. They just want to have their cake and eat it.

@FrancisSeaton how immature of me to point out someone who is party to betraying another and has no qualms about it, is being used.

She's not the one "cheating" - he is

She's not the one "cheating" - he is

Oh give over, we don’t live in individual vacuums. I agree he is more to blame but she’s not exactly innocent either.

No but it's the misogynistic hyperbolic way you do so.
If he kept his dick in his pants is the main issue

I hear what you’re saying. But honestly from the people I’ve known in real life (in the workplace and vague acquaintances) the vast majority of people behaving like this were exactly the sorts of people I would expect to behave that way. I don’t think I’ve ever had a moment where I’ve thought ‘surely not him/her?’ I accept it happens because I’ve read about it on here but I think it’s unusual.

On a purely practical level, I don’t see how my DH or I could have an affair without the other noticing. He works at home all the time, I’m also at home a lot. In the evenings we’re usually together. Any behaviour or routines outside of the usual would be noticed very quickly.

I agree with you. People are so naive to the fact that men indulging in affairs are abusive wankers, abusing their wives. I bet if you asked an OW whether she thinks the charming, sex deprived, wounded puppy that she shags from work is abusing their wife they would say God no! He brings her to events, they post pictures online blah blah blah but what do they think he's like like her behind closed doors if she gets a sniff of what he's up to? Gaslighting, weird sulking and tantrums to allow him some space and time to sneak around without the horrible wife confronting him, financial issues as he starts using family money to book places, things and general shit to enable his affair and meet ups with the OW, the horror of the deceit for the wife when she does find out and realises the time their dd/ds was poorly and he was 'working late' he was actually in bed with another woman, both of them removing the wife's ability to truly consent to the sex life she thinks she has exclusively with her husband. Its gross. I've worked with a lot of domestic abuse victims over the years, it's my field of work and 99%, literally have been a victim of infidelity. If they aren't sure the signs are all there that they have been, the ex husband is just such a master manipulator that the wife will never find out. Had one particularly sad situation that I did not deal with but is broadly used for training, where the wife was left to miscarry her baby alone whilst the husband was with the OW. When the wife finally snapped and confronted the OW, thinking she might help her by telling the truth that the husband had been calling her mad, crazy, she refused to say what had happened citing the usual mumsnet trope that its the husbands marriage and responsibility and therefore not for the OW to ever feel bad about kr say, no matter how much she could help this poor woman and instead told the ex husband of her being contacted by the wife ( he wasn't an ex at the time ), of course the husband went ballistic and the wife was beaten to a pulp having never been violent with her before. People will never accept that abuse that affairs enable for a married partner. Usually its mental abuse as there's so much lying that tskes place for an affair to happen but can get physical so quickly when the men realised they're being found out. I find the posters saying affairs are natural and should be accepted are really bad taste and victim blaming. Refusing to believe the abuse is there and is caused by married men and OW doesn't meant it isn't. The OW on this thread needs to also think about the hell that wife is probably.gojng through behind closed doors too.

My exHB’s arbitrary timescale must have been about 8 hours 🙈

His ridiculous ‘justifications’ included “You never scream during sex like they do on porn”. (Very difficult to scream with five kids in the house); “You wouldn’t let me have anal sex” (I had previously been attacked and anally raped, so it wasn’t something I was prepared to do); “You just don’t seem to enjoy sex as much as the women on porn”. He was also a porn addict, and most of his justifications centred around him believing that a normal healthy sex life should be just like porn. 🙄

The absolute irony is that it was me who was unsatisfied with our vanilla sex-life. I’d always suggest ways we could spice things up, and he’d look at me like I was a dirty little tart for wanting more. The truth was that he believed a wife should be ‘pure’ and virginal, and exciting sex was something you did with people outside the marriage. He was a bona fide misogynist.

He sounds utterly horrendous @Menomeno. Very glad you got out of that. 💐

So many people are capable of having an affair. People you'd never know expect. People you love, people you respect. People you socialise with/work with/go to church with/you brother /sister/ aunt /uncle- the sweet old lady behind the post office counter. Are they all evil morally bankrupt tossers or just flawed humans fulfilling some kind of need they are lacking?

So sorry for what you went through @Menomeno - well done for getting out 💐