Realize,
we cannot prove "true or
false" any comments being made
here. We hope to hear about some
good qualities about the person
because we know we're going to hear
the bad.
From
Psychology Today:
Written by Frank Pittman
Hour after hour, day after day in my
office I see men and women who have
been screwing around. They lead
secret lives, as they hide
themselves from their marriages.
They go through wrenching divorces,
inflicting pain on their children
and their children's children. Or
they make desperate, tearful, sweaty
efforts at holding on to the shreds
of a life they've betrayed. They
tell me they have gone through all
of this for a quick thrill or a
furtive moment of romance. Sometimes
they tell me they don't remember
making the decision that tore apart
their life: "it just
happened." Sometimes they don't
even know they are being unfaithful.
(I tell them: "if you don't
know whether what you are doing is
an infidelity or not, as your
spouse.") From the outside
looking in, it is insane. How could
anyone risk everything in life on
the turn of a screw? Infidelity was
not something people did much in my
family, so I always found it strange
and noteworthy when people did it in
my practice. After almost 30 years
of cleaning up the mess after other
people's affairs, I wrote a book
describing everything about
infidelity I'd seen in my practice.
The book was Private Lies:
Infidelity and the Betrayal of
Intimacy (Norton). I thought it
might help. Even if the tragedy of
AIDS and the humiliation of
prominent politicians hadn't stopped
it, surely people could not continue
screwing around after reading about
the absurd destructiveness of it. As
you know, people have not stopped
having affairs. But many of the feel
the need to write or call or drop by
and talk to me about it. When I
wrote Private Lies, I thought I knew
everything there was to know about
infidelity. But I know now that
there is even more.
ACCIDENTAL INFIDELITY
All affairs are not alike. The
thousands of affairs I've seen seem
to fall into four broad categories.
Most first affairs are cases of
accidental infidelity, unintended
and uncharacteristic acts of
carelessness that really did
"just happen." Someone
will get drunk, will get caught up
in the moment, will just be having a
bad day. It can happen to anyone,
though some people are more accident
prone than others, and some
situations are accident zones.
Many a young man has started his
career as a philanderer quite
accidentally when he is traveling
out of town on a new job with a
philandering boss who chooses one of
a pair of women and expects the
young fellow to entertain the other.
The most startling dynamic behind
accidental infidelity is misplaced
politeness, the feeling that it
would be rude to turn down a needy
friend's sexual advances. In the
debonair gallantry of the moment,
the brazen discourtesy to the
marriage partner is overlooked
altogether.
Both men and women can slip up and
have accidental affairs, though the
most accident-prone are those who
drink, those who travel, those who
don't get asked much, those who
don't feel very tightly married,
those whose running buddies screw
around, and those who are afraid to
run from a challenge. Most are men.
After an accidental infidelity,
there is dearly the sense that one's
life and marriage have changed. The
choices are:
1. To decide that infidelity was a
stupid thing to do, to confess it or
not to do so, but to resolve to take
better precautions in the future;
2. To decide you wouldn't have done
such a thing unless your husband or
wife had let you down, put the blame
on your mate, and go home and pick
your marriage to death;
3. To notice that lightning did not
strike you dead, decide this would
be a safe and inexpensive hobby to
take up, and do it some more;
4. To decide that you would not have
done such a thing if you were
married to the right person,
determine that this was meant to
be," and declare yourself in
love with the stranger in the bed..
