Forgiving an emotional affair

[broken99]

Has anyone done this?

The brief version is, the relationship isn't really romantic, but my BF became very attached to a woman who was infatuated with him and spent a lot of time with her behind my back without telling me.

He was isolating away from me as a key worker (as was she) and over many months she sort of met his needs when I wasn't around :( He says nothing was wrong with our relationship, I meet all his needs but apparently I wasn't there and he was lonely!!!

No sex happened
No kissing or anything
No romantic exchanges

I know all this is the truth as I have properly checked into it and also spoken to the woman and got both sides of the story. It's not helpful if people comment that I am getting an edited version of the truth, as I am 100% sure I have the full truth as I made bloody sure I did.

I realise this sounds like possibly just a friendship but it wasn't (at least from her side). They spent a lot of time spent together, doing inappropriate things like having dinner alone together at her house and it included deep, emotional attachment. She says she had fallen in love with him.

His version is he thought they were friends and didn't realise how inappropriate it was or that she was interested in him romantically. Her version is that she made it clear she was interested in him romantically and although she admits he rebuffed her advances and told her he loved me and wasn't interested in a relationship with her, he continued to cook her lunch and ask her over for coffee or to watch a film and so on.

I can't fathom how he thought it was okay to do that, but obviously he knew it wasn't okay as he never mentioned her to me and I found out when I noticed this woman tagging him on Facebook.

The worst part, is that he got very close to her and got very sad when he had to stop seeing her. That is the part which has broken me, because maybe I could wrap my head around isolation causing a friendship to get close in circumstances it otherwise would not have, but he seems to be having withdrawal from her :(

He says he loves me completely and has no romantic feelings for her but she was giving him "emotional fulfillment" (eg: he enjoyed being loved by her). He says he wants to work things out with me and he is willing to do anything (he has done everything I have asked) but I can't get over how bad I feel inside that he formed an emotional connection to another woman.

Has anyone ever gotten through this before? I feel like the relationship is soiled, ruined and I am no longer special and unique in his eyes and he says this is not reality and that he was never in love with her but was just enjoying what she was giving and had never really had close female friends before.

I spoke to the woman, and she is actually very nice, I can see why he liked her. She's clever and funny and a good conversationalist and she even made ME feel like she was emotionally supporting me :( She assured me that it's me he loves and she was just filling a gap. I just can't understand why he is missing her if he loves me. I feel sad, depressed, angry, confused and have no idea what to do.

@wanadu2022 this is so helpful.

I agree with all you say, but my BF is a serial monogamist who is quiet man with few friends and is quite awkward. He always gets (historically) all his needs met in his primary relationship and while this was always me, when we were split for six months more or less and he was locked up in isolation with this woman (key worker colleague) 24 hours a day, he ended up forming a bond with her that normally would have only been with me. That hurts very badly. Like I am just replaceable if I am not there!!!

I don't worry at all that if I leave he will be back in contact with her, partly because she hates him and has moved on, but also because I did actually leave for a short while after this all came out and during that time he met with her for closure and explained to her that he truly did love me and not her, and that even if he were single he didn't return her feelings in a romantic way but cared deeply for her (she told me this)

The other thing which I find really upsetting, is that he says he only misses her when things are bad between us - even though it is his emotional affair with her that had MADE things bad with us. So he says he doesn't think of her at all when things are good, but when things are bad or we are arguing he says he misses how it used to feel when he would chat with her :(

He's basically telling you that if you aren't living up to his expectations mood wise, it will be your fault if he has an emotional affair / inappropriate relationship with someone else. Think about whether that is the action of a man who is sorry, learned his lesson and wants to make you feel comfortable and secure.

He says that it was different with her because he has no feelings for her, so he could just sort of bask in the light of her adoration.

See now this would have me totally and utterly turned off. He knew someone was in love with them and despite not returning those feelings at all, he used her by spending time with her and maintaining a close bond knowing she wanted more. All to massage his ego. You know who does that? Selfish pricks. He says he misses her but as much as he's been a shit boyfriend to you, he's been a shit friend to her. He sounds horrible.

Incidentally, until this happened, he didn't miss her. For the months she was pining after him he was fine and said he didn't think of her at all but as soon as she hated him and stopped chasing he went through this weird grief thing.

It's not that weird when you realise he's the kind of arsehole who wants what he can't have, then when he has it, he isn't bothered about it anymore.

So to me, even if his version of events is true (which I think it may well be, I don't agree that more definitely happened) it would have shown me he was so selfish and unfair to all parties involved that I wouldn't want to be with him anymore anyway. A total user.

And he's training you up nicely to think that if you are down, or away, or not catering to his ego then he will get what he needs elsewhere and has given you fair warning so it'll be your fault.

Is that a dynamic you want long term? Don't you think it's revealed how selfish a person / how much of a user he is?

@RaiseTheBeastie I know it sounds strange and for the first few months after I found out, she was hassling him and sending him messages begging him to leave me for her which was HORRIBLE. He had already met with her to tell her it wasn't happening, but she didn't want to accept it.

Then I decided to speak to her to get her to sod off and I was really horrible to her at that time and told her she should leave us alone and accept he didn't love her.

A while later she contacted me to apologise for being such a bunny boiler, and for the suffering she caused me. She said she didn't recognise her own behavior and that she had just believed she was in love and that they had a connection and she got obsessed.

At that time, she answered all the questions I had honestly. Some answers hurt me (like her telling me they cuddled sometimes) and some helped me (like her telling me he did always tell her he loved his GF and didn't want her that way) but I felt she gave me the truth and it matched more or less what he had confessed.

I came to see her as a nice, albeit, wounded person who formed a crush on someone who (in fairness to her) was obviously spending time with her in a way a man usually does if he is interested. He was literally hanging out with her every night and perfectly happy to have her cook dinner so he is not innocent.

I can't say I blame her very much for what happened and I do feel he led her on and took advantage. He knew how she felt, he had no business going anywhere bloody near her IMHO and I didn't see it as her responsibility to protect my relationship.

@Honeycombskl thank you, this is helpful. I do think he lapped up the attention, but I think it's worse / more worrying than that. What I believe is that he formed a genuine sense of caring, emotional interdependency with this woman basically because I wasn't there, and now he has feelings OF SOME KIND for us both :( I am not saying I believe he is in love with her, I really don't think he is, but some of the normal day to day needs you get from a partner, he forged with her :(

I have no fear it would ever happen again, not least because of how badly this has affected him mentally, physically and emotionally but also because the insane circumstances of being locked up for a pandemic away from your partner with a colleague who fancies you are quite unusual and would not occur again.

OP I say this with respect but he has done a total number on you, feeling sorry for them and trying to understand why, sod that! He betrayed you and she would have willingly destroyed you! Delete them both from your life, he's shown who he is and he plays the victim to get what he wants, that's vile.

A couple of years ago my fiancé was messaging a woman he worked with. I found out myself after checking his phone - despite me having suspicions and straight up asking him if there was something going on, he would always deny it, but we women know don’t we! It was a really fucking hard time, I was heartbroken. It was near christmas, I lost my grandma 2 week after I found out and I had what I think was Covid in the first two week of Jan 2020. Just the worst time of my life. I gave myself some time to decide what I wanted to happen, but lockdown came along, in my eyes it saved our relationship. At this point I’d fallen out of love with him, I only realise this now looking back that I didn’t love him at the time. We worked through everything, spending all that time together helped us in ways I can’t explain. I fell back in love with him and told myself if a man can make me fall in love with him twice, then it’s something worth saving - we’ve been together 9 years in October, not something I was willing to just throw away, but not something I was going to just let go! The woman he worked with was made redundant last month, can’t lie I was ecstatic about it knowing he wouldn’t be seeing her anymore, not that he was anyway and she’d been furloughed the whole pandemic. We were supposed to be married last month but postponed it due to Covid and now we’re actually expecting our first baby in September - something I would not have even considered this time last year, for me to make this step was big because I didn’t want to just have a baby to save the relationship. It’s something we both discussed and really wanted and felt we were in a good position to do so! I had to do a lot of soul searching to forgive him and so did he, he was just as devastated as I was, the relationship had took a turn he wasn’t expecting and it just went too far, no physical relationship all just messaging! It all depends on you and your headspace.

Hmm OP, the only thing I'd say is it's a cop out that he says he did this only because he was isolated with her. There will be plenty of ocassions in the future where you may not be as available. Work or life may take you away, you may have a child together and that takes most of your time, you may have an ill parents or take up a new hobby. Is he going to get moody then and develop an attachment to a neighbour or another colleague or one of the mums at school?

@youvegottenminuteslynn has made a good point here:
"He's basically telling you that if you aren't living up to his expectations mood wise, it will be your fault if he has an emotional affair / inappropriate relationship with someone else."

He's not taking any real accountability of what he did, subtly putting the blame on your lack of availability and tbh it's ridiculous that he tells you he misses her when things are bad between you!! That feels manipulative to me - and is to the point above, that if you aren't available or a good gf or causing problems, he will turn to someone else.... There are plenty of men and women who can forge friendships with someone when they work away/are away from family, and don't get so emotionally entangled, or keep it secret. In my old job, I'd have to work in another city/country for months/years at a time and of course, it would get lonely. So i would befriend colleagues, but they were just friends. I still communicated with my exH every day and so didn't need anyone to replace him. I needed people to chat to, and have dinner or drinks with - not a relationship substitute. So I think maybe consider a bit more whether he has the kind of personality that will latch on to a woman if his primary emotional support isn't available? If he's been single before with no gf and survived, he couldn't survive 6 months without you?

I agree with pp to not be friends with that woman. Tbh you have no idea what they have discussed and agreed behind your back, or what her intentions are. She may have moved on, doesn't mean she is unlikely to want to sabotage or meddle out of spite or revenge or her still hoping he goes back to her. It seems hard to believe that someone who was so in love with a committed man has suddenly grown a conscious and lost those feelings...Also anger is the opposite of love, indifference to him would show she has moved on. If she's still angry, she's still in love.

Sorry - anger is NOT the oppposite to love, indifference is.

@BeeDavis Thanks so much for this, it was so helpful and I am so happy for you. I understand what you're saying about both being devastated.

I think part of the problem I am having right now is that when all this first happened he was so great and was taking control and making effort 24 / 7 to show me how much he loved me and so on. I felt really positive initially about getting over this.

Over time, things just got very difficult. When the second bloody lockdown happened, we were separated AGAIN and yet again she was nearby and I wasn't and it was so stressful on me because she was chasing after him and I was anxious all the time about it.

It took such a massive toll on us over months of me being paranoid and angry and him trying desperately to make me feel better but failing and her not going away. We discussed him quitting his job, but it wasn't quite that simple because he's a healthcare worker.

When things got really tough, we were away from each other and I was crying all the time, that was when he said he started to miss her company, which obviously made things a thousand times worse. Probably really insensitive for him to say that to me. I really don't know why he didn't keep his mouth shut.

As lockdown eased at the end of April, we were allowed back together again but I felt it was so tainted after he'd said he missed her that things weren't the same. Now but some of the feelings of love had gone for me because I don't know how to feel in love with somebody who just told me they missed another woman :(

It's just been dreadful and he's crying all the time saying he loves me and has ruined his life, and I don't look at him the same way I used to. I've been at the point of having my bags packed by the door and he was crying and holding onto me saying "please don't go, we love each other, this is mad" but it's generally just horrible and we used to be so happy.

I am wondering if leaving for a while is best. Either to get my head clear or to push the reset button. I just feel betrayed and dirty and like if he could care for another woman or feel an emotional connection that I am not special anymore and I feel so sad all the time.

I hope we can fix it, I want to forgive him, but it feels so hard to fix what we had :(

@wanadu2022 I agree with what you're saying, and it's crossed my mind, but I also can't imagine any other circumstances where he would be locked away from me for five months without us being able to see each other. That was how it worked between dealing with family things and his job in the background of the pandemic. I only really saw him for about three weeks in a 9 month period so it was pretty significant. That said, I have been sitting here pondering if I am ever not available for some reason, like if I am seriously ill or something - and he's my husband later on - is he going to try and get his needs met elsewhere??? It just seems so weird to me that he thought it was okay. He says with hindsight he would do a million things differently but at the time he thought it was harmless :(

One of the first things we did together after all this came to light was to read affair books, and one said that it was essential to have no contact with the affair partner, even if you felt it was over, because it put your spouse under permanent threat due to risk of relapse. It was that the temptation was that in the aftermath of an affair, things would become very hard with your spouse and you'd instinctively want your affair partner for comfort.

Although this wasn't a sexual affair, I completely agree with what the books said. In an ideal world, after all this happened he would have had no contact with her, he and I would have been alone together, and we could have worked it through without her in our face. As the circumstances were, he and I got a couple of months together (during which things were really good) and then there was another lockdown during which she was back in his face and I could not see him. So basically she was seeing him every day and I could not. The mental torture for me was beyond words.

I think he has shown such a weak streak in his character, because when that was happening and I was crying and sick from stress, he was basically thinking "oh things are awful with Broken99 and I am stuck locked up by myself, I wish I could go back to how nice it was when I was hanging out with other woman and everything was happy and fun".

What are your thoughts on this? Because for me, selfish doesn't really do it. It almost shows an unbelievable level of self absorption and a complete lack of empathy for me. He didn't go near her, but he wanted to :( Imagine how I felt???

I don 't think he is manipulative- he hasn't really got the ability for that sort of thing. It's more like he has no filter and takes everything literally. We read affair books and did some counselling about intimacy and I think he took the "complete transparency" advice way too literally and feels he needs to tell me everything. Also, strangely, in the early days of this mess he was also insensitive enough to be using her as a marriage counsellor and telling her how much he loved me and had screwed it up!!!

I agree that he could have just made friends with colleagues, and I am not sure why he felt the need to have that level of one-on-one intimacy. I don't think he's ever really been single, just gone from one relationship to the next. I am not sure what the psychology of that is. He admits, from this, he has realised he needs someone around.

I am not really "friends" with that woman. We were just friendly. We have closed communication now and she seems happy with her new fellow. She actually says she's in love with him too now after two months. She just falls in love easily I think. She was going through a divorce and feeling low and was a bit vulnerable. I think she saw my BF as the perfect package as he has a really good job, money, respect and so on. Plus he's a very kind and gentle person.

This women did everything she could to get him away from you but now she has made friends with you. She is no friend, that's for sure.
Don't listen to her. You don't go from absolute adulation and prepared to break up someone's relationship to hating someone. Even saying hate is an emotive description that shows investment in the other person. Indifference is where it needs to be and this is far from that on all sides.

This isn't over and being her confident and friend keeps everything alight.
First bin her and then let your partner demonstrate he has no emotional reliance on her or her on him

I could end up in your OH’s position, I have some female friends I am incredibly close to. Not many, but one or two. One in particular is one of my closest friends, we’ve seen each other through many ups and downs. The difference between me and your bloke is if that friend developed romantic feelings for me I’d have to distance because to do otherwise would be supremely cruel to her. It is possible for women and men to be very close friends, and a romantic/sexual relationship is a completely separate connection so you shouldn’t feel second best. It sounds to me like he could do with communicating with everyone better though.

@ClareBlue thanks Clare, I don't speak to her anymore, I am just saying we got on well. She is now as madly in love with her new man as she once was with my BF, I think she is just in love with being in love!!!!

@Dervel thank you for this, it's comforting. I agree he was quite cruel to the woman, she was obviously vulnerable and had strong feelings for him so even if he had been single he should not really have spent time with her. I am not defending her, as I know she was also in the wrong, but really it's only him who's behavior I care about because he's my BF and she's nothing to me

@broken99
My ex h had an emotional affair prior to us getting married. He has always stood by that nothing physical happened but I personally can't believe that, rightly or wrong, it's something I always struggled with.

For a long time I felt a huge sense of betrayal obviously, it sent me into a spiral of depression and prescription drug addiction. He could never be straight with me and I'd find out little bits here and there and eventually spoke to the woman. I pulled myself together and eventually we married, but I knew at the back of my head I'd struggle with this for a long time if not always.

Long story short I couldn't ever trust him, so when other little marital issues came up that do when you have young children and you're exhausted and he didn't help much around the house, it was all made even worse because there was no trust there so I felt really lonely and it was the thing that made me not want to fix the marriage. I never felt j could turn to him for support or to share my problems with, because previously they had been shared with someone else.

I once told someone to her face that there was nothing going on with me and her ex and she even gave me a hug as she left my house. I was lying. We have been together 8 years now.

Well you are a lovely person aren’t you Sillawithans. I just hope it all comes home to roost for you 🙏🏻

@Sillawithans. Well that’s honest if somewhat awful— how would you feel now if someone did that to you

I don't think it helps to feed my paranoia :D The lady in question is all over her social media blasting her loved up new man. I really don't think anyone's playing games with me but that's not to say they're not secretly in love and desperate for each other and he's about to dump me, which is not a thought that I have entirely discounted.

@broken99 do you want to spend the rest of your life with a fucked up head like this ? It's really that simple.

Do you want to be with someone so pathetic and so cruel that he needs ego stroking and attention to the point he betrays his partner and leads on someone he knows is besotted with him? And then blames both of them to varying extents (you for being absent through no fault of your own and her for still wanting to see him when he said he didn't feel the same) instead of being genuinely remorseful. He sounds like a right prick!

@Crikeyalmighty not really awful. She had left the country, gone to Ibiza for 3 months, they had broken up. She found out he had met someone new and came back. She turned up at my house one night about 11:30/midnight demanding to know what was going on between us. I felt so bad for her but you know, their relationship was over and he had moved on.

I did mention ex in my previous post.

My point to the op was people only show you what they want you to see, tell you what they want you to know.

I have been cheated on and I wouldn't do that to anyone, certainly not an innocent woman who was married to a bollox.

Thanks for your judgement though.

@TheStirrer I said her ex.

So in one breath he sadhe was just being a friend, the next breath he admits it was love and being by here.
Sorry but he is lying to her, the truth you believe isn't true.
Heaping because despite what he says he caught feelings for her.
I also doubt they sent the whole time platonic (not kissing or sex), but also doubt either would admit anything to you. They probably created a over story should you ever find out bout them

Ok, stop trying to get back to where you were, that relationship has gone. Said kindly.