“It’s a Cultural Thing”

Posted on November 20, 2013 | 1 Comment | Edit

I don’t pretend to know all that much about other cultures. I know that in my culture, cheating is frowned upon. I’ve often heard it said ( usually by wayward spouses and other men/women) that in their culture, infidelity is the norm and most people either embrace it or look the other way.
Maybe this is true…as I said, i don;t pretend to know all that much about it. I do wonder, though, if this acceptance is real or if it’s more of a resignation to the idea that since infidelity has always happened, one can’t do anything about it so they just have to put up with it, no matter how hurtful.
Do the betrayed spouses view infidelity in the same light as those who benefit from it ( wayward spouses , other men/women)? Do they think it’s okay, or does it hurt them just as much as it does anyone else?
There have been time that I’ve had the opportunity to talk with women from these cultures who have an unfaithful spouse. ALL I can say is that it hurt them just as much as it hurt me. There was no real difference. Perhaps the the ‘acceptance” is more in the eyes of the people cheating.
What do you think?

Is it ever okay to have an affair?

Posted on July 23, 2013 | Leave a comment | Edit

Is cheating ever justifiable? Is it ever okay?
From my point of view, it’s never okay. There are always alternatives.
One such alternative is divorce. I know that no one likes to think about ending their marriage, and it’s never an easy thing, but there times when it really is for the best.
There are people out there ( usually it’s people who are in, or have been in, an affair) who say ” it’s not that simple…I don’t want to hurt my spouse or my kids, I don’t want to lose time with my children, I don’t want to lose my house, half of my assets, etc. I’m unhappy in my marriage, and having an affair makes me happy”…
The logic of an wayward spouse never ceases to surprise me…
I mean come on, who do they think they are fooling?
What do they think is going to happen if they get caught? Their spouse and children will be hurt far more than they ever would be if the marriage ended on good terms.
I think the person they are really protecting is themselves…
I understand the fear, I understand the need or chnage and I even understand that a person can reach a point where being married is completely wrong for them…
but simply put, cheating is never the answer

A message for betrayed husbands everywhere

Posted on June 15, 2013 | Leave a comment | Edit

When the discussion turns to infidelity, betrayed husband’s often seem to be a forgotten group. I’m not sure why this is, but it seems really unfair.
I think that they hurt every bit as much as betrayed wives do, but all too often they either suffer in silence or people some how blame them for the cheating.
Now I’m not a man, and I can’t claim to know juts how a man feels when they have been betrayed, but if it’s anything like I felt, it must be awful. Add to that the feeling that they have no one to turn to for care and support, and it must be a very lonely place to be indeed.
The betrayed husbands that i have known personally were treated horribly by their wives. Their hearts were stomped on, and when they did open up about it, all too often they were treated with disdain or, if they admitted that they still had feelings for their wives, they were made to feel like less of a man for feeling that way.
I don’t like that one bit.
On the off chance that a betrayed husband reads my blog, I’d like to say a few words directed at them.
Your spouses cheating is not your fault. They have a problem and they took it out on you. Your marriage may not have been perfect, but like anyone else who cheated, they had other choices they could have made, and they chose infidelity.
You are not less of a man, you have nothing to feel embarrassed or ashamed about. It’s also okay if you still love your spouse. You can’t be expected to just turn your feelings off.
Whether you reconcile or divorce is up to you and you alone. Whatever decision you make, do it because it’s what’s right for you, and don;t worry about what anyone else thinks.
You will get through this. Your days will get better and  you will find happiness again in your life.If you choose to stay together, that’s great, but if you don’t, please don’t give up on love. There is someone out there who will love you and treat you the way you deserve to be treated…with respect and love
Don’t be afraid o ask for help in getting through this. Counseling or therapy can make a huge difference.
I repeat…you will get through this. Many of us have stood right where you are, we understand what it’s like to be betrayed. We got through it and you can too

When it was a Workplace Affair…

Posted on July 30, 2013 | 3 Comments | Edit

Was your spouses affair with someone they work with? My husband’s was. when all the dust had settled, he had to keep working with her, and I won’t lie to you…at first, that was really hard for me.
He did his best to reassure me that the affair was 100% over, and would find ways to show that I could trust him. Like anyone else in my position, it was damned hard for me. He’d go to work and I’d do what I had to do around the house and whatever else I could think of to keep my mind off of things.
After a while, it finally occurred to me that I had to make an effort to start trusting him again.I had to kind of flip the situation over and see it from a different angle. Instead of trying to find clues that he was cheating ( there weren’t any), I had to find signs that he wasn’t. That was so helpful to me.
Of course there were people who felt that i should tell him to ask to be posted to a position somewhere else, where they wouldn’t be around each other every day, but that simply wasn’t an option. Besides, if I was to trust him and that he was truthful about wanting our marriage, then it shouldn’t matter where he worked or who he worked with. he wasn’t going to cheat. I didn’t want it to be that the only reason he didn’t cheat was because there was no temptation to. I wanted him not to cheat because he didn’t want to.
A big hurdle that I also had to jump was facing the fact that I had to start trusting him again sometime, and if I couldn’t trust him there, i couldn’t trust him anywhere…
I took some time, and it didn’t come easily, but gradually I found myself able to see things from that perspective.
As time went by, the worst part about him still working with her was that i had to see her at his work functions. She tried to talk to me, but I wasn’t in the mood for that. Mind you, she still kept up with her pestering, and even sent him some emails telling him I was cheating on him…which, of course, I wasn’t. She also tried to spread gossip about me, but as time went on, she showed her true nature and people stopped believing her anymore.
I’m so glad that I was able to trust him again. I can honestly say that in the four years since his affair, he’s never given me any reason not to.

Sleeping with another woman’s husband

Posted on August 31, 2013 | Leave a comment | Edit

This is just a short post, as it’s late and I’m tired.
I think I get why a other man or woman wants to forget that their affair partner is married. In some ways, it probably makes things easier, especially if they have a conscience.
so man of them speak about how hard it is to end the affair, how guilty they feel, and how they know it;s not right for them but they just can’t seem to let go.
I wonder if it would be any easier if they were to find a picture of the betrayed spouse, and attach a sticky note to it that says “I am sleeping with is wife or her husband and they don’t deserve it. This family will be ripped apart and their children hurt. The affair needs to end. NOW!” . put it in the bathroom so it’s the first thing to be seen in the morning and the last at night. Put on on the cellphone laptop, monitor, or wherever else they are needed.
Maybe this exercise may seem futile, but perhaps the constant reminders and the fact that they are next to a picture of the person in question may make them seem tangible and real…someone with feelings too.
I don’t think that most other men/women want to hurt the betrayed spouse…it’s more likely they are either trying to avoid thinking about it  because it’s painful, they think they deserve to be betrayed or they simply do not care if the betrayed person gets hurt or not…so long as they get their own way.
Don’t stoop to the level of “if it wasn’t me he or she was having the affair with, it would be somebody else”. The truth is, it;s not somebody else…it’s you! You have the power to stop allowing it to continue. Sure, married married person will simply find another affair partner, but if they do, did they really care that much about you in the first place? If not, then why stay with them?

Why the righteous indignation?

Posted on April 14, 2014 | 1 Comment | Edit

As I have often said, not every other woman is a bad person. Many are simply making a very bad choice that I, quite honestly, do not understand.
Sadly, there are some for whom affairs are simply a function of their being a nasty sort of person, and other become that way as a function of their affair.
The later is quite sad, as it speaks volumes about the mental gymnastics a person must go through in order to feel good about being in a relationship with a married person.
I will never get that at all.
What relationship is worth selling out your soul for, especially knowing full when that when you go in to it, it is not above board?
When you strip away all the rhetoric and justification, the end result is that it is a dishonest relationship, and someone who really didn’t deserve it is going to be hurt.