Wookie essay alert, feel free to ignore. 😂
I’ve always thought that the trope that men having affairs automatically means their marriage must be an unhappy one isn’t always true, even before my husband had an affair. It’s not true in all cases and regardless which is true, it’s still an inexcusable thing to do.
I think men and women are capable of having a happy home life and marriage and still enjoying the extra validation and ego boost from a different person. You might enjoy fun nights out and sex with somebody else but never want to turn your life upside down for them.
Everyone gets hit on at some point, admiration and flattery feel good too. But it’s what happens next in a monogamous relationship that’s important. Sometimes it’s people just knowing that they are still desirable that’s enough, and it goes nowhere beyond a glance or a quick flirty conversation. Then sometimes this repeats and seems harmless, they think “I’m not actually cheating (definitions here always debatable) so why not enjoy it again?”
The more often you do something the less guilty you feel, and what you allow yourself to do continues, and what continues will escalate. You get so used to lying to yourself with false justifications that the guilt of each escalation gets morally diluted with time and the self-justifications ramp up a notch. When my husband had his affair we were having date nights as usual, sex, happy holidays, he arranged anniversary stuff and family stuff for us to do, both worlds totally compartmentalised.
He wasn’t unhappy at all, he’s admitted he wasn’t, but he also said he told her he was, and he told himself he was, because he had to in order to kill his guilt and keep her invested. I doubt she’d have liked him as much or felt so special and happy to continue to sleep with him if he didn’t.
To invent dissatisfaction and blame me or the marriage did wonders for his guilt and culpability and fanned her ego as his saviour, the poor neglected little lamb, 🙄 and gave her a justification for any qualms she might have had (or not) for her part in the deception and helping him hurt me and our kids.
It was in both their interests to believe that his tragic unhappiness and her opportune wonderfulness was his “why”.
He knew that if he didn’t portray himself as a victim of an unhappy marriage and disinterested wife, and therefore didn’t need OW to ‘save’ him, then she’d see that sincerity wasn’t exactly his strong suit and see where she actually stood. He needed her to think that of course he’d never cheat on his wife and deceive his family for his own selfish ego, no sireee etc etc, ‘cause that would mean he’d just be a selfish entitled cheat, and she might see that she was getting used just for ego boosting and sex and fun on the side.
What MM ever initially tells his potential OW that actually he’s fine at home and his wife is great, thanks very much? Not many, unless they are sure the potential OW is ok with being a fuckbuddy.
“I just want to have sex with you with no expectations of a future real relationship, I’ve already got one I really like. No, I’m not unhappy in my marriage and I want that part of my life to remain intact and unchanged, but I find you attractive, and your flattery and attention makes me feel like a teenager again (his actual words to me were “I felt like James Fucking Bond”.) and nobody is ever going to find out so why not, fancy a shag? I’m never going to leave my wife but I just fancy sex with you and I’ll tell you whatever you (and I) need to hear to get that to happen and keep happening.” Admitted very few MM, if ever.
It’s perfectly possible for people to lie to themselves and let stuff escalate to a situation they thought they never find themselves in. Not an excuse, but absolutely possible. They are fully responsible for getting themselves there and they made all the choices themselves, but it can still shock the hell out of them when they finally face what they’ve done and who they have become. It’s not always a drunken ONS next morning “My God, what have I done?”
I don’t think people actively always set out to cheat. It can be a gradual thing which gets out of control until somebody, or circumstances, force an assessment of the situation and a halt.
You don’t have to be unhappy to pull a stunt like that on yourself. The worst lies are the ones we tell ourselves. It was so tempting to see my husband as the victim of a harpie, a temptress, but he wasn’t. It was his choice, his decision. It started small and gradually escalated. I get why victims of infidelity want to villify OW, it makes it all much more simple. I get why people think they must be unhappy at home (more stealth blaming women for men’s poor choices) But my husband is no Oscar winner and was happy at home. It was very, very clear when it finally started to get to him, I’d had no idea of anything being wrong up to that point.
Read “Mistakes were made but not by me”. It outlines the psychology behind how normal, decent people ended up to their armpits in some of the biggest scandals in history, how lying to themselves plus temptation or validation in some way enabled good people to do stuff they never thought they’d every ever do. Eg good scientists who initially had deep integrity and gradually bent their own rules and ethical standards to submit what they knew were falsified results. Public servants who wanted to do a good job ended up bending rules and breaking the law. Teachers who started out with a deep vocation and initially firmly believing in giving everyone an education on a level playing field, ended up under/ over marking or fudging school results in an attempt to falsify league tables etc to appear better, their initial solid integrity shot to pieces. Different pressures make decent people make bad choices. They don’t have to be evil or unhappy for this to happen. It’s more than usually a frog in gradually boiling water situation than an instant moustache-twirling evil villain moment. Small transgressions easily brushed aside which grow to larger ones, until they’ve got so skilled at lying to themselves and twisting the truth to provide justifications that perspective is lost until they are forced to back up their internal justifications with facts and can’t. They’re not true. Not many people probably wake up one morning and say ”dang it, I’m so unhappy I’m going to look for an affair/ be an OW.”
Happy or unhappy, if it’s flattering and it feels good it just takes lying to yourself and justifying how much you deserve it to turn “I would never, ever” into “why not?”