0:05

Hey, this is Annie and Samantha.

0:06

I'm welcome stuff.

0:07

I never told you production I heart radio. So

0:18

this classic has actually been on my list to bring

0:20

back for a while, but after the recent

0:23

Monday mini that you did Samantha

0:25

on work Spouses, it's like, yeah,

0:27

we should bring this one back. It's about emotional

0:29

affairs and emotional cheating, which

0:32

Kristen and Caroline did. I

0:34

at the time had never heard of it, but

0:37

when I listened

0:39

to it it learned about it, I was like, yes, I know what

0:41

that is. You know what I mean, Like I didn't have kind of the terminology.

0:44

I hadn't really thought about it.

0:46

And we.

0:49

Have so many ideas listeners, and a lot

0:52

of them we get from you. But one that

0:54

I've mentioned and has been put off and put off and

0:56

delayed and delayed is on divorce. And

0:58

I have actually heard from some of you. So

1:00

thank you for sharing your story about

1:02

how complicated divorce can be just

1:05

legally, like not even the emotional part, but

1:08

just legally getting your affairs

1:10

in order, your finances, all of

1:12

that stuff. And the frustrating

1:15

thing is that I did not know is

1:17

that depending on the state, it varies

1:19

pretty wildly. Here in the ums.

1:22

Yeah, so I want to We

1:24

are going to do it. It is in our

1:26

folder. I already have the documents.

1:29

I don't think it'll happen in March,

1:31

but it will happen.

1:33

I'm really I.

1:34

Think it's just going to be a

1:36

lot of a lot

1:38

of work to dig into in

1:41

different states. But I do want to do it. It is going to

1:43

happen. But I thought this would be a good

1:46

since we did that episode on work spouses and then in

1:48

preparation for the upcoming

1:51

episode on divorce, a good

1:53

one to bring back, So please enjoy

1:55

this classic episode.

2:00

Welcome to Stuff Mom Never Told You

2:02

from how Stuff Works dot Com.

2:09

Hello, and welcome to the podcast.

2:11

I'm Kristen and I'm Caroline, and

2:14

today we're talking about emotional cheating.

2:16

Yeah, basically when that work

2:18

spouse we talked about last time, maybe

2:21

things go a little too far.

2:23

Or you've got a friend that you start

2:25

confiding in more and more and more, and

2:27

suddenly that friends starts looking more and

2:30

more attractive.

2:31

Yeah, but you're not like getting naked

2:33

together, but you're just having these long,

2:35

deep conversations and

2:37

really connecting and confiding and

2:40

bonding.

2:40

And slowly abandoning your own relationship.

2:43

Yeah, I mean, this is

2:46

such a rich topic to talk about

2:48

because we have a

2:51

lot more emotional

2:53

cheating capabilities than we used to you thanks

2:55

to social media, which we'll get into, but

2:58

also because it's one

3:00

of those areas in long

3:03

term relationships where you have to be

3:05

so honest with yourself

3:07

because it's easy to

3:10

make excuses to yourself

3:12

or to your partner, to whomever that Oh

3:14

no, this isn't problematic at all, because

3:17

it's not like we're kissing, we aren't having sex,

3:20

we're just talking a

3:22

lot.

3:22

We're just like going to lunch every day.

3:26

I'm just kind of in love with her. Oh

3:29

no, it's fine.

3:31

Yeah, I mean there's a lot of self

3:34

preservation delusion

3:36

that goes on during

3:39

a lot of emotional affairs

3:41

that keeps them going well.

3:43

And this is also one of those things that comes up all the time

3:46

in terms of gender and cheating,

3:49

the whole assumption

3:52

that men will be more jealous

3:54

of physical cheating, of someone

3:57

having sex with another person, whereas

3:59

women are more jealous of emotional

4:02

affairs.

4:04

And we'll get into that some, but let's

4:07

go ahead and put it out there.

4:08

Do you are you familiar with

4:10

emotional affairs. Do you know anyone who has had an emotional

4:13

affair?

4:14

A friend of mine, a

4:17

very good friend of mine, was in the danger zone

4:19

a couple of years ago her

4:22

high school. She's married kids, she's

4:24

been married to the same guy for a long time, been

4:26

with him for a long time since high

4:28

school, and a

4:31

previous high school boyfriend resurfaced

4:34

having some marriage trouble. He reaches

4:36

out to her. They start up like

4:38

a Facebook back and forth side

4:42

note and we will get more into this in a little

4:44

bit, but Facebook is cited

4:46

in a massive number of divorces.

4:49

So anyway, I knew that I had

4:51

on my podcasting research in my brain as

4:53

she's telling me about this, and you know, she's

4:56

doing the total stereotype,

4:59

like everything's fine, We're just talking

5:02

all the time. This woman with

5:05

her children, with her full time job. She

5:07

was literally like giving up sleep to

5:09

get into these long drawn out Facebook,

5:12

email, text conversations, not

5:14

to mention, like on the phone conversations,

5:18

not only like counseling him as

5:20

he was going through this rough patch in his marriage,

5:22

but like confiding

5:24

in him about a lot of stuff. And I was like, you've got

5:27

it. You've got to stop, Like, I know that you're really

5:29

happy to be back in touch with someone from your

5:31

past. He was a nice guy back when we knew

5:33

him. That was a long time ago. You

5:36

guys are both married, and you

5:39

you are confiding really personal

5:42

things in him that he doesn't need to

5:44

know, frankly, And she

5:48

basically said that,

5:51

well, just you know, it feels good to talk to someone

5:53

aside from my husband about this stuff.

5:55

And I mean if I could have shown

5:58

up at her house with like those airplane

6:01

direction wants and be like no,

6:04

stop, go the other way, I would

6:06

have and

6:10

things eventually cooled down. Luckily,

6:13

she and her husband are great and fine and everything's

6:15

fine. The other guy, uh, did end

6:17

up having an actual physical affair with someone

6:19

else, leaving his wife and now

6:21

he's with a woman that he had an affair with.

6:25

Dangerous own city totally.

6:27

But yeah, that's that dangerous

6:29

ledge of like, once you start forming that intimate

6:31

bond with someone else and add the excitement

6:34

of someone new, relatively,

6:37

that's a recipe for disaster.

6:39

Oh yeah, I mean anecdotally,

6:42

the emotional cheating that I've witnessed

6:44

tends to follow a very similar

6:47

pattern of reconnecting with an

6:49

ex, whether you sought them out

6:51

because they're troubled waters in your

6:53

own relationship, or it

6:56

just happens that you two ran

6:59

into each other, whether offline or online.

7:02

And there's something about

7:05

those particular kinds of reconnections

7:08

with an X that get so dangerous

7:10

so fast, because there is that sense

7:13

of a false sense of intimacy

7:15

that can arise, where it's like, oh, I

7:17

forgot I could talk to you like I

7:19

couldn't talk to anybody else.

7:21

And because as you're telling me this about

7:24

your friend.

7:24

And how good it felt for her to

7:27

say some of those things to someone other than her husband,

7:30

the first thing I think is, well, where are your

7:32

friends who you didn't.

7:35

Date where things couldn't get complicated?

7:37

Right?

7:38

I mean, she was talking to you.

7:40

But obviously there's that

7:44

satisfaction that we derive from

7:46

the attention that exes

7:49

can give us. Not to say that emotional cheating only happens

7:51

between exes, but I'm just slam.

7:54

I've seen it happen a lot.

7:55

Yeah, And I mean that's not to say that people

7:58

can never be friends with their exes. Obviously,

8:00

you know, obviously people can,

8:04

but that's that's just dangerous

8:06

water. Yeah.

8:07

Well, especially it all seems to

8:09

hinge on motivation, where it's like if

8:12

you're suddenly talking to your X again and things

8:14

just so happen to be not so

8:17

healthy at.

8:17

Home might be a red

8:20

flag. Yeah.

8:21

Practice and self awareness, yeah, check.

8:23

In with yourself.

8:26

So what are the hallmarks

8:28

then, of emotional affairs

8:30

versus just having a close friendship,

8:32

Because, like you said, it is totally

8:34

possible to be friends with your exes. If

8:37

you are straight, you should be able

8:39

to have opposite sex friendships,

8:42

et cetera. But where does that line

8:44

start to get blurry?

8:46

Well? All right, so here are some things that

8:49

hopefully should serve as an excellent

8:53

blowing up of any denial you're

8:55

in. So you

8:58

avoid telling your significt and other

9:00

about the person and your interactions,

9:02

which that sort of secrecy automatically

9:05

makes you, guys a unit. It automatically makes

9:07

things a little more exciting. Do

9:09

you find yourself getting dressed up for

9:11

that person, putting on a little more makeup, doing

9:13

your hair a little bit nicer? Do

9:16

you find yourself telling

9:18

this other person about your day, your

9:21

frustrations, your hopes and dreams,

9:23

your fears and anger, whatever,

9:26

Rather than telling your significant

9:28

other. And that's an important one because

9:30

a lot of psychologists and researchers that

9:32

we read their stuff about this. We're

9:34

saying that when you share those deep

9:37

thoughts and fears and et cetera, that

9:39

breeds this intimacy that can deepen

9:42

those bonds and can lead you, like

9:44

my friend, to start feeling like, perhaps

9:47

this person just gets you more

9:50

than your significant other does.

9:51

And that would probably open the door to

9:54

maybe confiding in that person about

9:56

your own relationship

9:59

to satisfaction and then

10:01

another moment to check

10:03

yourself before you wreck yourself or your relationship.

10:06

You start comparing that person to your

10:09

significant other, so essentially

10:12

like you're building an idealized version

10:14

of whoever this alleged

10:17

friend is.

10:18

Yeah, and because you're already in like total delusion

10:21

land, it's easy to only see the

10:23

pros of someone rather

10:25

than the cons as well. Do

10:28

you find yourself thinking obsessively

10:30

about the person? And if you're

10:32

like, well, no, I mean, of course, like he's

10:35

funny and like, you know whatever,

10:37

do you think obsessively about your friends?

10:40

Here in Carolina? I think about you all.

10:42

The time, because I guarantee you, my

10:44

friend who was going through all that was not sitting around

10:46

her house like obsessively thinking about when the next

10:49

email for me was going to come in, because

10:51

frankly, I don't email that often anyway. And

10:55

the whole thing of like, are you increasingly finding

10:58

more justification for your behavior

11:01

or for continuing the relationship when

11:05

you start feeling really defensive

11:08

or entitled to this interaction,

11:11

that's probably a bit of a red flag as well.

11:13

Yeah, to pay attention to your own relationship

11:15

either if you need to get out of it or get

11:18

it working again and.

11:20

Get it together.

11:21

Get it together. People.

11:23

On the flip side of that, if

11:25

you are with someone that you suspect

11:28

might be engaged in this kind

11:30

of emotional cheating, what

11:33

are what are the kinds of things that you

11:35

should pay attention to and kind of validate

11:38

for yourself.

11:40

Well, one thing to pay attention to

11:42

is are you starting to feel crazy?

11:45

And I don't, I mean, I say that sounds really flip,

11:47

but like, are you starting to feel as

11:50

though something is just

11:53

off and something feels wrong. Maybe

11:56

your spouse your significant others acting

11:59

a little differently and telling you nothing's

12:01

wrong. That's called gaslighting. Your

12:05

gut doesn't lie, and

12:07

so even if you start to feel

12:09

like something's off in your interaction, maybe

12:12

ask ask what's up. And

12:15

related to that is that you sense your partner

12:17

isn't himself around

12:19

you. Maybe he or

12:22

she is getting

12:24

something else from this person that

12:27

he's having an emotional affair with, and he can

12:29

be more playful with that person or more

12:31

silly or more serious whatever

12:33

it is that he feels, for whatever reason,

12:35

that he's not getting with you. And

12:37

then like, have you ever been in the situation And this could

12:39

totally be innocent where you're like, well,

12:42

how is your day, honey, and the

12:45

person's like, ugh, I mean I already

12:47

told Karen all about it.

12:48

You're like Karen.

12:49

You're like, Karen, are you telling

12:52

Karen all about your day? I want to hear about your day.

12:54

I'm your person.

12:55

Also rudest response, how's your day?

12:57

Well, you know what I already told Karen, So I'm.

12:59

Sick of talking about it. Karen gets me, just talk

13:01

to Karen. But it's that idea of like, oh,

13:03

you already told someone all about your

13:06

frustrations and whatever you're

13:09

you're not confiding in me as much.

13:11

And another big thing is sex feeling

13:14

detached. Diane

13:16

Gerhardt who's a professor of marriage and family

13:18

therapy at California State University,

13:21

told Red Book magazine

13:23

in April of twenty fifteen that as

13:26

the intensity of the emotional connection

13:28

with this other person builds, it

13:30

detracts from the emotional connection in

13:33

your own marriage, and that can't

13:35

help but affect what goes on physically

13:38

and emotionally between you two.

13:40

So there is a physical element to emotional

13:42

cheating, but it's with your person and

13:45

not this person who you

13:47

are becoming attached to. And

13:50

if you start noticing that,

13:53

let's say your person keeps bringing up

13:55

Karen comparing, you

13:57

know, kind of in a way of comparing everything

14:00

you do to what Karen does better.

14:02

You know, like you know,

14:05

Karen loves.

14:07

Uh, just she loves

14:09

hot dogs.

14:10

Karen loves hot dogs. She can eat so many

14:12

of them.

14:13

Yeah, she's she's basically like a competitive

14:16

food eater.

14:18

Well yeah, red Flag.

14:19

If you ever, if your spouse ever

14:21

talks about a coworker's eating.

14:23

Habits, you get to that therapist

14:26

days up.

14:28

No what on a serious note, I mean, it's those kinds

14:30

of things of you know, person

14:34

makes a joke and maybe you don't

14:36

laugh, and then your person's like, well, Karen

14:38

thinks I'm funny.

14:39

God, you know what, Karen, you

14:42

can just well.

14:44

Maybe Karen doesn't know, but this is going on. Maybe

14:46

Karen's just like politely laughing.

14:49

Oh yeah, Maybe he's obsessed with

14:51

Karen.

14:52

Maybe Karen's oblivious.

14:53

Maybe we need to warn Karen.

14:55

We got to talk to Karen.

14:56

Oh God, I'm sorry, Karen. I didn't mean to judge

14:58

you, but so one of my favorite

15:01

resources in the world is, of course a magazine.

15:03

Of course, if you know me, you know it's Sandwiches

15:06

Cory Giese an oh magazine,

15:09

and Gail Saltz, who's a

15:12

therapist, was writing a column

15:14

about the danger zone that

15:16

can prompt an emotional affair

15:18

or kind of push you over that edge,

15:21

and three sort

15:23

of dangerous dangerous

15:26

activities she lists are flirting

15:29

with other people because

15:32

you can you can get kind of hooked on that

15:34

that high of like the attention you get

15:36

when you're flirting.

15:37

Unless that's part of like you and your your

15:40

person's rag.

15:41

No, that's good. That's good if like you and your person are

15:43

flirting.

15:44

Well no, I'm saying, like, if if you and your

15:46

person are into flirting

15:48

with other people.

15:49

Right, Well, but then that that requires communication.

15:52

And the whole thing with emotional infidelity is

15:54

that you're hiding it exactly.

15:57

So if you are flot

16:00

with others in an intoxicating, hidden

16:03

secret fashion, stop it.

16:07

Two innocently spending

16:10

time alone with old lovers that's that whole denial

16:12

thing, and three

16:15

hanging out with emotional cheaters

16:18

who kind of normalize

16:20

that behavior. This is the same thing

16:23

Kristin and I have talked about before when

16:25

it comes to like kids in smoking, or

16:27

like sexual activity from a young

16:29

age or whatever, Like if all your friends

16:31

are doing it, you know, maybe you're still not

16:33

sure, but if everybody around you is doing it,

16:35

it seems more normal and acceptable. I'm

16:37

like, oh, Gym's

16:40

getting away with it. Maybe Karen and

16:42

I can go sneak

16:44

off and exchange text messages.

16:46

Yeah, side by side.

16:48

Yeah. I mean in middle school, all my friends were emotionally

16:50

cheating left and right.

16:52

I couldn't resist. And

16:56

there's that avoidance factor too, Like you said.

16:58

I mean, communication and a

17:01

I feel like is the answer to every relationship

17:03

problem. You're either not doing

17:05

it or not doing it effectively. If

17:07

you are avoiding talking

17:10

about your issues and

17:12

things that you might feel are lacking

17:14

in your relationship. That

17:17

can definitely backslide into

17:19

finding someone who can be your sounding board.

17:32

It's hitting those rough patches

17:34

in your own marriage. And you sort of touched

17:36

on this earlier in the episode about

17:39

you know you're hitting a rough patch. Maybe you're

17:41

feeling lonely or unfulfilled somehow,

17:45

maybe you're just depressed, and

17:47

assume that this is just how marriage

17:49

is. That there's not good communication and

17:51

the other person gets you less

17:54

and less, and so rather

17:57

than communicating with your person

17:59

you're sick nificant other, you seek

18:02

that fulfillment and excitement elsewhere.

18:05

And what's interesting is that Gail

18:07

Saltz wrote inn O magazine that she's actually

18:09

seeing more emotional

18:13

infidelity these days. A because

18:15

she says, we're so used to being exposed to sexually

18:18

suggestive material quote that there's

18:20

no longer an obvious verbal or physical

18:22

line we think we're crossing. So maybe that's that dangerous

18:24

flirtation of like, stop

18:27

stop flirting with other people. But

18:30

B she says, we are connected

18:33

with others more than ever

18:35

before thanks to technology and

18:38

social media, so it's entirely possible

18:40

that you might have some sort of roster of ex'es,

18:43

or just like people that you're kind of interested

18:45

in on Facebook or Twitter or whatever that

18:48

you wouldn't necessarily be keeping

18:50

in mind if you weren't on social media.

18:52

And it's become so common that

18:55

researchers call it remote infidelity.

19:00

Hello, here's a statistic that

19:04

might surprise. It seemed awfull

19:06

high to me. A Wired magazine reported

19:08

that as many as forty two percent

19:10

of Tender users aren't single. Now,

19:13

granted, that would technically include

19:15

me. For an evening when I was

19:18

out with friends, one of whom was single,

19:20

you know, and so we all got on Tender, like

19:22

in solidarity, and it was fun for

19:25

an evening. And then I realized that my now husband

19:28

was also on Tender, and I was like, oh, no, we

19:31

cannot do this. He was he got on Tendered

19:33

that night. I should say I didn't like find

19:35

him on tender.

19:37

Oh lore, but I bet that happens, oh

19:39

totally.

19:41

Oh and the whole thing too of

19:43

online dating relationships that start

19:46

and then you go on some dates

19:48

and you go on to Okay,

19:50

Cupid or Tender to shut down

19:53

your account, and then see that they're

19:55

still active and you're like, what's up

19:57

with this, Come on now,

20:01

But Facebook seems to be

20:04

really the the playground

20:07

of remote infidelity.

20:09

Yeah, well, because Facebook

20:11

is supposedly so innocent, like, oh

20:13

my gosh, here's like Johnny

20:15

from middle school. Here's Johnny,

20:18

and like this is fine, right, I'm just connecting

20:21

with old classmates because oh there's

20:23

Karen and Jim and

20:25

Johnny. This cast of character thinks

20:28

apparently they're all like nineteen fifties Bobby

20:31

socks ers or something. But you

20:33

know Facebook, like your mom's on Facebook,

20:36

your grandmother's on Facebook. What's

20:38

the harm?

20:38

Well, and how often does Facebook

20:40

probably serve up those you might know?

20:43

Oh god, I wonder how many of those are my

20:45

boyfriend's ex girlfriends, because

20:47

my boyfriend does get like you

20:49

should be friends with and it's like an ex

20:51

of mine and I feel the need to apologize,

20:54

even though it's not my fault. It's Facebook stupid algorithm.

20:56

But thanks Facebook.

20:58

So Facebook normalizes

21:00

and sets the expectation that you're going

21:02

to keep in touch with people from

21:04

your past, and that you're going

21:07

to connect with acquaintances.

21:09

You know, maybe there's someone who's caught your eye in the office

21:12

or whatever. But it's

21:14

totally normal. To be Facebook

21:16

friends, right when.

21:18

In fact, what you might be doing is

21:21

setting up a backburner so

21:23

that if things turn south, or

21:26

if you you know, if you are just kind of dissatisfied,

21:28

you feel like your relationship is in a slump and

21:31

your eye starts wandering, you

21:34

might just innocently enough kind of

21:37

reconnect with some people on social

21:39

media and have the people on the back burner

21:41

so that you can you can leap

21:44

straight from your old relationship

21:46

that's going down into flames into

21:49

at least someone else's bed.

21:51

I think, I mean, I have

21:53

been a back burner. I

21:56

years ago now, there was this guy

21:58

that I was really interested in, and we flirted

22:00

all the time, and we talked about hanging

22:03

out, but like it never happened, and it was like, why

22:05

isn't he asking me out? Like we're both clearly interested

22:08

in each other, And I had like broached the subject of

22:10

hanging out and kind of never picked

22:12

up on it. But I still was like getting heavily flirted

22:14

with, so like all this cognitive dissonance

22:17

going on in my head. And we finally

22:19

hung out and he

22:21

you know, uh, we were actually

22:23

playing scrabble and

22:26

he at the end of the night, he like dashed right,

22:28

he like ran basically he had to

22:30

leave really soon. I was like, all right,

22:33

ended up seeing him at a Braves

22:36

game, a baseball game, with

22:38

not only a woman, but a

22:40

baby.

22:43

My jaja dropped.

22:44

Yeah, and so I was like, oh,

22:46

well, that

22:49

could explain why he was

22:51

so weird about like why it took

22:54

so long for us to a go on a date, but

22:56

b why he madly dashed

22:58

out so fast at the end of the night.

23:01

He never disclosed that he had a baby.

23:03

Well, I don't even know if it's I don't know what the situation

23:06

was, but no, he didn't disclose any of that, and

23:08

like, clearly it was not his sister. That's all I'm saying,

23:10

you know what I mean, Like this woman was clearly not

23:13

like, Oh, I'm in town with my sister. And

23:18

months and months and months later, you know, I'm dating

23:20

someone else. I'm happy, it's everything's great.

23:23

And I get a Facebook message

23:27

from dude and he's like,

23:29

hey, how's it going. Uh,

23:32

it looks like you're, you know, having a great

23:34

time and just hope you're

23:36

still kicking ass and blah blah blah

23:38

blah blah. And I mean, I blocked that guy so

23:40

fast, like get get out of here. And I was

23:42

telling dud roommate about it, and he's like, oh yeah,

23:44

that guy's checking to see if you're still on the roster. And

23:48

so I'm pretty sure, like I was totally a

23:50

back burner because what I'm assuming is that he

23:53

was so weird because he was in

23:55

a serious relationship, potentially

23:57

with a child. I was not privy

24:00

to any of that information, but he

24:02

made sure to remain in touch

24:04

on Facebook until

24:07

I realized what terrible

24:09

things were happening. And it's

24:11

interesting these researchers in twenty

24:13

fourteen from the University of Indiana found

24:16

that men tend

24:18

to have about twice as

24:20

many backburners on Facebook as

24:23

women do, but it's still a widely

24:25

practiced phenomenon among men

24:27

and women well.

24:28

And that study also cited a separate

24:31

survey from one Poll which

24:33

found nearly half of all women keep in touch.

24:36

With a quote unquote backup

24:38

husband. Yeah.

24:40

Oh man, so we have like our work wife,

24:42

our backup husband.

24:44

We just got people all over the place.

24:46

And on average, respondents

24:49

in relationships said that they had romantic

24:51

or sexual conversations with

24:54

two people besides their current

24:56

partner.

24:57

I how do you? I

25:00

I don't have the mental energy

25:02

to like a even do that. But

25:05

be like, don't

25:07

you want to address the problems

25:09

in your relationship?

25:10

No, because that is harder.

25:12

That takes speaking words, whereas

25:15

typing words is.

25:17

You know, we have so much more hutspah,

25:21

yeah, I guess.

25:23

And part of this is

25:26

related to conversations we've had

25:28

and lots of articles we've read about

25:30

how supposedly online dating

25:32

is ruining dating and relationships for everyone

25:35

all the time forever. It's not yeah,

25:38

well yeah, But the theory is that now

25:42

dating is like the wild West, and you have so

25:44

many options available to you that you

25:47

never have to settle because there's always fifty

25:50

more people in line on tender okaycubit

25:52

or whatever that if you're fed up

25:54

with someone, rather than working on it,

25:57

you could easily just find the

25:59

next handsome woman

26:02

or man on an online

26:04

dating site.

26:05

But I wonder if people would be discouraged

26:07

from doing that if they knew how,

26:11

you know, other, how widespread that

26:14

is.

26:14

You know what I mean.

26:14

It's like you're not special for

26:18

having a roster of back burners, because,

26:20

for all you know, your back burner considers

26:23

you a back burner, and that's

26:26

not sexy.

26:27

No, that is not sexy. But

26:29

the whole availability of options

26:32

thing is a factor

26:34

that researchers and psychologists site

26:37

in terms of these emotional

26:40

infidelity issues and even

26:42

sexual infidelities, So not just emotional stuff,

26:44

but affairs in general, that if you perceive

26:48

there to be this huge network

26:50

of available people, you are

26:52

more likely, if you're already predisposed,

26:54

whether it's because of relationship problems or whatever,

26:57

you're more likely to partake well.

26:59

And oh, complicating matters

27:01

too is how we tend

27:04

to curate our social media

27:06

presences. So we're showing how

27:09

fabulous our life is, how interesting

27:11

we are, and so that probably

27:14

adds to the idealizing

27:16

aspect of a lot of this emotional cheating

27:19

too, because it's like.

27:19

Oh, my god, look at her.

27:21

She's on a boat.

27:23

Then she's eating she's eating so many

27:25

well plated meals, and

27:29

there's a parade that she went to. What

27:32

a cultured gem

27:34

I forgot about?

27:35

Yeah, Karen, Karen

27:38

and her parades. My god.

27:41

Well, moving aside how technology facilitates

27:43

this, we need to unpeel

27:46

some of the psychological layers that

27:49

keep us going back to these

27:51

kinds of dangerous relationships.

27:54

So we've taken away all of your excuses and your

27:56

deniability about like, oh, we're just friends.

28:00

Know better now, Karen, Karen,

28:03

Jim. We're looking at Johnny, Johnny,

28:06

Susan.

28:09

So despite knowing all of this stuff,

28:12

it can be hard if you're wrapped up in it,

28:15

to stop, to just stop, even

28:17

if you're like I am threatening my marriage.

28:20

This is a bad idea someone could find out.

28:22

But it just feels so good. What why

28:24

are people not stopping? It is

28:26

so addictive?

28:29

And the thing is, as Athena

28:31

Stike over at psych Central wrote

28:34

about in twenty twelve.

28:35

It's less about how special.

28:37

This other person is and more

28:39

about the neurochemicals

28:42

that reward us

28:46

in communicating with that person.

28:48

Yeah, I mean, because we already talked earlier about how

28:51

you know. Oh, it just it just feels good

28:53

and it's secretive and it's exciting,

28:55

especially if you're understimulated, if you feel

28:57

understimulated in your own relationship.

29:00

And Stike cites Craig Nacan

29:02

who wrote The Addictive Personality, Understanding

29:05

the Addictive Process and Compulsive Behavior,

29:07

and he says that addiction

29:10

is quote a pathological love

29:12

and trust relationship with an object,

29:15

person, or event. It's

29:17

the out of control and aimless

29:19

searching for wholeness, happiness,

29:22

and peace through a relationship

29:24

with an object or event. And clearly

29:27

that can apply to when you're filling that

29:29

gaping emotional whole with alcohol,

29:32

when you are abusing drugs,

29:35

when you're shopping obsessively, but

29:37

that can also apply to all of those

29:40

happy chemicals flooding your brain when

29:42

you're having a secret emotional

29:44

affair.

29:46

So what Nakean says

29:48

is that we derive pleasure from

29:51

numbing the pain, shame, or

29:53

guilt because we've distanced ourselves

29:56

from taking responsibility for

29:58

issues happening in our relationships that have

30:00

led us to this point.

30:02

Because, after all, irl relationships

30:05

that we care about carry the risk of pain

30:07

and failure and have ups and downs. Everybody

30:09

goes through rough patches. But

30:12

if a person chooses to stray from

30:14

their relationship, are

30:16

there predictable differences

30:19

in whether men

30:21

and women are going to get

30:23

physical with someone else or get more

30:25

emotional.

30:27

Well, so the stereotype is

30:29

that women are going

30:32

to have the emotional affairs,

30:34

but they're also going to be more

30:37

upset if their partner has an

30:39

emotional affair, whereas men are

30:41

going to get physical and they're also angrier

30:44

when their partner has a physical

30:46

sexual affair with someone else. And

30:49

this has been looked at up,

30:51

down, and sideways according to gender

30:54

sexuality, sexual identity,

30:57

gender identity, all

30:59

of these different factors. And it's

31:03

not that actual studies haven't

31:05

supported the assertion that men,

31:08

you know, hate sexual affairs more and women

31:10

hate emotional affairs, but there's

31:13

a lot of disagreement over why that

31:15

particular stereotype might be the

31:17

case for some people. So there was this two

31:20

thousand and two article from the American

31:22

Psychological Association's Monitor

31:25

magazine that reads, to

31:28

me anyway, like the most

31:30

boring, hilarious academic

31:32

catfight, because it pits evolutionary

31:37

biology theorists against

31:39

people who are like, can we leave

31:41

off with the cave men and women who were

31:43

fighting with each other in the caves and

31:46

just deal with the emotional and neurochemical

31:48

things that are going on? So tell me more.

31:51

Well. So, the evo bio

31:53

explanation for why

31:56

a man might be more upset

31:58

about physical cheating and a woman might be more

32:00

upset about emotional

32:03

cheating is that they

32:05

argue, we have evolved

32:08

with special sensitivities to the type

32:10

of infidelity that threatens us most

32:13

so in this

32:15

theory, men are more concerned about

32:17

sexual infidelity because of the risk of

32:19

inadvertently raising another man's child

32:22

paternity uncertainty exactly,

32:25

whereas women, they say, are more

32:27

concerned about emotional infidelity

32:29

because of the threat of losing their

32:31

mate's support in

32:33

raising those children. And so

32:36

they see the malemate's emotional

32:38

engagement with another woman as a sign that

32:40

he's about to pack those caveman's suitcases

32:44

and head out of the cave to

32:46

somebody else's cave. It's

32:49

not a euphemism, and that triggers

32:51

jealousy. But there's also an interesting

32:54

dynamic when it comes to what men and

32:56

women, and we're talking in of course, binary

32:58

and heteronormative terms here when

33:01

we are discussing these cave people, there's

33:04

some interesting dynamics about assumptions

33:06

that men and women are making about each other. Researchers

33:09

found that men assume that emotional infidelity

33:11

is happening in conjunction with sexual

33:13

infidelity. They just assume they're happening together

33:16

because and this is

33:18

in very stereotypical broadbrush terms,

33:20

But men are more likely to believe that

33:22

women are not going to get sexually involved

33:25

with someone they're not emotionally connecting with,

33:27

whereas women are more

33:29

likely to assume that men are

33:32

just having a sexual affair

33:35

that doesn't necessarily

33:37

involve emotions.

33:39

So that's what the evolutionary

33:42

biologists claim. Yes, But then

33:44

of course we have these other researchers who

33:46

take a look at the methodology and say,

33:48

okay, these are all based on

33:51

forced choice surveys, where it's.

33:53

Like, if pretend that

33:55

someone's shooting on you, would you rather?

33:58

And they say that that produces false

34:01

results and that it

34:03

also glosses over individual

34:06

circumstances. Clearly, like you said,

34:08

I mean, it's talking in very broad brush terms.

34:10

There is no nuance to that whatsoever.

34:13

And it also claims that sex

34:15

differences vanish when

34:17

you remove the need to pick

34:19

one or the other and have participants

34:22

focus on a separate task while being

34:24

asked the question.

34:26

So you're kind of like distracting your brain.

34:29

In an effort to what

34:31

probably like get that gut response, yes,

34:33

of like what makes you feel

34:36

terrible inside?

34:37

Fold these clothes? Now tell me your thoughts

34:39

on affairs?

34:40

I hate laundry. Actually

34:42

I love laundry. But they found that

34:44

when you are like waving a shiny set

34:46

of keys in front of somebody as you ask them the

34:48

question everyone, man,

34:51

woman, straight, gay, bisexual,

34:54

whoever, everybody's more upset

34:56

about sexual infidelity when you just

34:58

don't stop to think about

35:00

it.

35:01

I buy that.

35:02

I totally buy that too, because it

35:05

almost takes a minute longer. If you're speaking

35:07

in gut terms, it almost takes a minute longer

35:09

to process, like, wait, you have deep

35:11

feelings for someone, versus like, oh,

35:14

you were naked together.

35:16

Yeah, like that took no time at all, whereas

35:19

yeah, this emotional relationship you

35:21

would imagine as like a slow build. Well,

35:23

in speaking of feelings, this jives

35:25

with the results of a study

35:27

from two thousand and four in Personality

35:30

and Social Psychology Bulletin, which found

35:32

that sexual infidelity is more associated

35:36

with anger and blame, whereas

35:38

emotional infidelity tends to spark

35:42

hurt feelings.

35:43

So if we have these like

35:45

sharper.

35:46

Reactions to sexual infidelity,

35:48

it makes sense that when the keys are being

35:51

shaken in front of our faces, where like,

35:54

don't sleep with other people, know

35:57

that amygdala is like yeah,

36:00

how dare you, Whereas

36:04

like creating

36:06

that intimate relationship with someone

36:08

else that might not be physical

36:12

can be devastating because the other person

36:14

might be sitting there saying, I've been wanting

36:16

you to talk to me about those things.

36:19

I'm here right, and I mean,

36:21

either one can shake the foundation

36:23

of your own identity, like, oh my god,

36:25

I have formed this identity as your

36:28

partner and as someone who loves you, and

36:30

here you are telling me that I'm somehow

36:32

not good enough, whether it's good enough sexually

36:34

or good enough emotionally, Like that can

36:36

really obviously do a number on you. And

36:40

there was a twenty fourteen study in the Journal

36:42

of Marital and Family Therapy that

36:45

looked at not only gender identity but also

36:47

sexual orientation, and they

36:49

found that across all of these factors,

36:51

again, sexual infidelity

36:53

elicited more distress than

36:56

emotional infidelity. But women

36:59

and great people on the whole

37:01

had stronger emotions about both

37:04

sexual and emotional infidelity than

37:06

men and lesbian and gay

37:08

people in the survey. It's very

37:11

interesting, so everybody's real upset

37:13

about infidelity, but women

37:16

and straight people are apparently

37:19

more upset on the whole.

37:21

Well, and there was a more recent study

37:23

that came out in January twenty sixteen

37:26

in the Archives of Sexual Behavior, which

37:28

found that while more

37:31

straight men were upset over sexual

37:34

infidelity than emotional infidelity and

37:36

straight women were more upset over emotional

37:39

infidelity, bisexual

37:42

men and women didn't really differ.

37:45

I mean, like across the board, and ditto

37:47

for lesbians and

37:50

gay men.

37:51

It's like, regardless.

37:53

Of who they might have been

37:55

with, they just weren't down with

37:58

any kind of cheating.

37:59

Is that kind of what what they were finding.

38:01

Whereas there's something about straight people where

38:05

we are more.

38:08

Maybe we're moraged. It

38:10

could be that we're more threatened by alternative

38:13

arrangements. I'm wondering, you know,

38:15

And I'm not saying that like oh, you're bisexual,

38:17

so you're tolerant of cheating, or like oh you're a

38:19

gay man, so you're like cool with your partner

38:21

having multiple partners, like your alternative

38:23

lifestyle. Yeah, yeah, I'm totally That's

38:26

not what I'm insinuating. But what

38:28

I am saying is that perhaps

38:30

if you are part of that like super heteronormative

38:33

mainstream, you've been force fed

38:35

these ideas about what marriage

38:38

and relationships are supposed to be,

38:40

and they are supposed to be your true love,

38:42

your soulmate. They are supposed to be everything

38:44

to you, your best friend, your accountant,

38:47

and your lawnmower, all

38:49

of these things wrapped up in one and

38:52

perhaps LGBTQ people

38:54

have had to imagine up

38:56

until you know, we're finally seeing marriage equality,

38:59

have had to envision alternate possibilities

39:02

for their relationships.

39:03

I don't know.

39:04

I mean, that's that's a theory, and.

39:07

I would think attached to that as well are

39:10

the normative gender roles that

39:12

are hitched to our

39:15

heteronormative straight relationship

39:17

scripts, where it's you

39:19

know, you have the men who are supposed

39:21

to be the accounts of the lawnmowers. You know, like guys

39:24

are supposed to provide one thing and

39:26

women are supposed to provide another.

39:28

You know, men are supposed to be the bread

39:31

winners.

39:32

Women cook the bread. They toast the bread.

39:34

I don't know, are the bread they do all

39:36

the bread things. And

39:38

there's also the idea too that masculinity

39:41

equals more aggressive, angers,

39:44

more acceptable.

39:45

And they want sex all

39:47

the time.

39:48

Right, So there is a lot of

39:51

like you said, there's a lot of gender norm

39:53

stuff, baggage and

39:55

reactions wrapped up in the survey

39:57

results.

39:58

Yeah, it sounds like a lot of straight

40:00

folks in these studies are operating

40:05

out of stereotypical

40:07

assumptions.

40:08

And maybe not really communicating well with each

40:10

other.

40:10

I don't know.

40:11

Yeah, I mean I think that this also gets

40:13

into the need for not just communicating

40:15

about relationship, be things with

40:17

your partner, but being able to communicate obviously

40:20

about sexualeting and

40:22

expectations.

40:23

Yeah, and boundaries.

40:25

Yeah you know, so

40:28

what kind of real talk do you

40:30

need to have if emotional infidelity

40:32

is happening, how.

40:34

Do you fix it? Well, so

40:36

a lot of this is advice coming from Gail Salt

40:38

again, but the first thing you want to do is

40:41

take responsibility. Don't try

40:43

to live in denial land. We were like, no,

40:46

we're just friends. Stop it, and don't

40:48

blame any infidelity

40:50

or like emotional cheating or anything

40:53

on your partner. Don't turn around and be

40:55

like, well, if you would just mowe the lawn more,

40:58

or if you had just brought me chicken home

41:00

from the grocery store, I would

41:03

not have done this. No, be an adult,

41:05

be a grown up, and take responsibility

41:07

for your actions and also end it. Hello, No,

41:10

you cannot stay friends

41:12

and keep the person in your life

41:15

or on your Facebook account if

41:18

you have committed emotional and fidelity

41:20

with them and you want to keep

41:22

your significant other. It's different if you guys are

41:24

breaking up and the kind.

41:26

Of brutal honesty that a lot of therapists recommend

41:29

these situations where I mean, you have to come

41:31

out, you know, and ask the questions

41:33

you need to ask, be straightforward

41:35

about what's going on, which can

41:38

which.

41:38

Can hurt, for sure. But

41:41

that's also where.

41:42

We can look to people who are insuccessful

41:44

open relationships or polyamorous relationships

41:47

and learn some lessons because these

41:49

people have emotional

41:51

and physical relationships with people

41:53

outside of a

41:56

primary unit, and

41:59

they operate right within

42:01

an environment of radical honesty

42:03

and even compersion,

42:06

which is a feeling

42:08

of happiness when your partner

42:10

finds someone that they

42:13

like and maybe want to have sex with.

42:15

I didn't. I don't think I knew there was a word for that.

42:17

Yeah, there is.

42:18

That's more within like the polyamory

42:21

lexicon. And

42:24

while I'm not saying that the answer is for everyone

42:26

to open up their relationships, but

42:29

I'm saying, like those

42:31

kinds of it's not about the sex, I guess is what I'm trying

42:33

to say is that there can be perfectly

42:35

healthy and happy, satisfying

42:38

long term relationships that

42:42

don't that don't require

42:45

monogamy because what we

42:47

require ultimately is honest

42:49

communication.

42:51

Right exactly. And so when

42:54

your partner has had

42:57

an emotional affair and your relationships

42:59

not open, and that's not gonna fly,

43:02

and hopefully you guys have already communicated

43:04

about your wants, needs

43:06

and expectations around monogamy or not.

43:10

You know, like Kristen said, there are some tough questions

43:12

and and you know, it's best

43:15

to stay away from the gritty nitty

43:17

gritty details, as you

43:19

know, and that's especially if there's been sexual

43:21

infidelity. But you know, asking

43:24

your partner, what are you getting

43:26

from this interaction? You

43:29

know, have I done something?

43:33

Is there something that you've wanted to talk to me about?

43:35

Is there something you're not getting from our

43:37

relationship? You know, is your self esteem

43:40

or your sense of self suffering?

43:44

And take heart that it doesn't have to be the end

43:46

of your relationship unless you want

43:49

it to.

43:49

Be right, and you can right

43:52

you can rebuild it obviously takes

43:54

a lot of time. Openness

43:56

and accountability there

43:59

will be to yours and possibly

44:01

some panic attacks. But if you guys

44:03

are dedicated to working through those

44:06

difficult patches, then I

44:08

think a better, more open

44:11

communication relationship

44:13

is on the other side of that.

44:15

Also, thank you for giving me the name

44:18

of my memoir, which

44:20

will be there will be tears.

44:21

And panic attacks. Keep

44:23

an eye out for that in your local

44:26

bookstore. Friends. Well,

44:28

is it time I think to talk

44:31

to listeners. Yes, we want to hear

44:33

from.

44:33

You about this issue because I

44:36

think it's super common and I think it's super

44:38

common for people to hide

44:40

it away, and it's

44:43

something that we need to be more

44:46

aware of and be more comfortable talking

44:48

about. Because the thing is humans

44:50

are fallible. People are attracted

44:52

to more than one person

44:55

a lot of times, and rough

44:57

patches happen. Stress can

45:01

you know, be devastating to a

45:03

relationship. So we

45:05

just we just need to be communicating

45:08

more. We just need to be honest, stop trying to be so perfect.

45:11

Yeah right, and and

45:13

block those shady x's on Facebook

45:16

seriously.

45:18

You know who you are.

45:31

So with that to send us your

45:33

letters, mom, Stuff at HowStuffWorks

45:36

dot com is where you can send them.

45:38

We will as always respect

45:41

your anonymity. If you would prefer that for

45:43

a more sensitive topic like this, or

45:46

if you just want to shout it out to the world, you can tweet us

45:48

at mom Stuff Podcasts or message

45:50

us on Facebook and we've got a couple of messages

45:53

to share with you right now.

45:59

All right, Well, speaking of relationships,

46:01

I have a letter here from Amy in response

46:04

to our lesbian bed death episode.

46:08

She says, I h blah blah

46:10

blah. She says, as a queer

46:12

siswoman, my friends and I have often joked about

46:14

the bed death thing, and one of my favorite images

46:16

when it's mentioned comes from Rick

46:18

and Steve. This amazing short lived

46:20

cartoon that was on Logo for a while where

46:23

Kirsten and Dana, the perfect lesbian

46:26

couple. One is butch one is fim, they want a

46:28

baby, et cetera, et cetera, attend the

46:30

funeral for the bed of

46:32

their friends Ebony and Ivory.

46:35

Seriously hilarious, but in all

46:37

seriousness, my spouse and I have

46:39

chatted about this a lot, because having now

46:41

been together for five years, married for nearly

46:44

two, and trying to make a baby least

46:46

sexy process ever for queer folks,

46:48

and so incredibly invasive, that's

46:50

an episode for you, and trying

46:52

out new medications. Our sex life has

46:54

dwindled substantially. We

46:56

ask ourselves whether we mind, and

46:58

the answer most of the time is no. I

47:01

think being raised female and being allowed

47:03

to access our emotions more readily than

47:06

many sifth straight men are quote allowed,

47:08

we are able to find intimacy in ways

47:10

other than through sex. We talk,

47:13

we kiss, we cuddle it, we flirt. We are

47:15

touching like all of the time, and

47:17

it satisfies a big part of that intimate urge

47:19

and need that having been in a quote straight

47:21

relationship previously, I would

47:24

have only felt that I had to have sex to satisfy.

47:27

Many of my friends express similar feelings

47:29

about the lack of what we typically consider sex

47:31

in our relationships. Intimacy and closeness

47:34

are achieved in so many other ways just

47:36

by being in touch with our connections to our partners

47:39

that just because we don't necessarily

47:41

orgasm while engaging in intimacy doesn't

47:43

mean we're missing out on some essential part of our

47:45

relationships. Sex is great, but

47:48

what is the goal in the end? If it is closeness

47:50

and eroticism and intimacy, then I get

47:52

it. All night long.

47:54

Folks.

47:55

Well, thank you Amy, and good

47:57

luck and congrats on the baby making.

48:00

Well, I got a let her hear from Alia,

48:02

who writes, I'm a pan sexual person

48:05

that came out from a previous relationship with

48:07

a man for ten years.

48:08

My fiance is the first woman I've.

48:10

Been with, and while I got into it not knowing a thing

48:12

about real female same sex physical

48:14

relationships, I have to say this.

48:16

Is the best sex I've ever had.

48:18

We just passed year three and things are

48:20

every bit as spicy as before. Yes,

48:23

we do it much much less, but if

48:25

anything, we are enjoying each other more

48:27

as we explore and create a safe space

48:29

to try all sorts of things. Entering

48:32

here four, I feel confident it

48:34

will stay strong.

48:36

Well, I'm so happy to.

48:38

Hear that, Ilia and everybody

48:40

else we want to hear from you, too, Mom. Stuff

48:42

at HowStuffWorks dot com is our email

48:45

address and for links to all of our social

48:47

media as well as all of our blogs, videos

48:49

and podcasts with our sources. So you can

48:51

learn more about emotional cheating,

48:54

head on over to stuff Mom Never Told You

48:56

dot com.

49:01

For more on this and thousands of other topics.

49:03

Visit HowStuffWorks dot com