Obsessed With Affair Partner (2023)

FAQs

What is the value of obsessing about an affair? ›

Obsessing about an affair and asking questions about the details of the affair potentially enables a new boundary to be constructed. When even small truths are revealed, the obsessing provides a pathway to work through and understand the story of the affair.

According to psychologist and relationship researcher Scott Haltzmann, infidelity is a “flame addiction.” A person having an affair craves the other person, wanting to experience the same addictive behavior repeatedly. This is due to a series of complex neurological, chemical, and hormonal changes.

Recognize your grief as a normal process that you are moving through. The research tells us that well over 60% of couples struggling with infidelity never divorce. Recovery from infidelity is possible, even likely in many cases.

The deep desire to win back one's partner's affections post infidelity is called hysterical bonding. This is most commonly with respect to the infidelity of a sexual nature. So, the one who has been betrayed sexually by their beloved indulges in sexual experimentation with their partner.

When both spouses are in a calmer place, feelings have been recognized and understood, amends made and an honest and sincere apology made and accepted, couples are ready to stop the conversation about the affair.

If it is a long-term, emotional affair, it usually involves limerence. Short-term affairs or one-night stands rarely if ever do. That is because limerence takes some time to develop.

Can an affair transform into lasting love? An affair can become long-lasting love when both parties are in love and are ready to do right by each other. This often happens when the person being cheated with seems to outperform the present partner. You might get confused if you are really in love or not.

Close to 25% of marriages stay together after an instance of cheating. And more men than women stay married when they are the cheating partner (61% vs 44%).

Infidelity undermines the very foundation of marriage in many ways. It causes heartbreak and devastation, loneliness, feelings of betrayal, and confusion to one or both spouses in a marriage. Some marriages break after an affair. Others survive, become stronger and more intimate.

By its very nature, a love affair prolongs those feelings of infatuation. People engaged in an affair spend little “real” time together. Most of their time together is spent in a fantasy world free of the stressors that daily life introduces into love relationships.

Do affairs make people happier? ›

“Findings indicate that while affairs do tend to make respondents happy, a number of factors influence perception of life satisfaction during an affair, including a belief that an outside partner is required to remain in a primary partnership, a desire to remain in the primary partnership, at least biweekly sexual ...

I love my family deeply and I will no longer do anything to risk their happiness. I will not be contacting you further and I ask that you do the same. I do not want to see you or hear from you. Please respect my decision to end our relationship and have no further communication.

In practice, it tends to be uncommon for a relationship to survive instances of cheating. One study found that only about 16 percent of couples who'd experienced unfaithfulness were able to work it out.

“Like any relationship, the amount of time it takes to 'get over' an affair varies,” Mohamedali explains. However, in some instances, the time it takes for emotions to subside is longer than the affair itself. “It usually takes six months to one year to emotionally bounce back,” Ghanbari says.

Dr. Carnes writes that in many cases of PTSD, infidelity causes new, distorted bonds to form between spouses. He calls these “trauma bonds” or “betrayal bonds.” Trauma bonds look different in every relationship.

“Usually, infatuation lasts for between 18 months and three years,” says Mundin. “Unless a long-distance relationship is involved or an extremely insecure individual is fascinated, infatuation rarely lasts longer.” The remnants of infatuation may help strengthen a relationship, however, according to Lee.

The "in-love" stage of a love affair typically lasts six to 18 months, and occasionally as long as three years, says Denise Bartell, PhD, psychologist at the University of Wisconsin, Green Bay. But it does wane at some point.

It depends very much on the circumstances. If the affair is known or strongly suspected, you're usually better off telling. You won't gain by denying it because you'll probably get found out anyway and you might save the relationship by confessing.

More than half of women polled (56%) said they had made their own secret checks to uncover a partner's affair compared to 29% of men. 'Phones are by far the most common way for cheats of both sexes to be exposed,' sex and relationship expert Jessica Leoni said.

Confessing is crucial if you're invested in someone other than your partner, she adds. That's because your affair could be a sign that some elements—say, sexual intimacy or other kinds of closeness—are missing from your current relationship, and you'll need to address them if you want your union to survive.

What are the 3 stages of limerence? ›

The three stages of limerence are infatuation, crystallization, and deterioration.

What Causes Limerence and ROCD? The intrusive thinking involved in limerence and OCD and has been associated with low levels of serotonin and elevated levels of dopamine and norepinephrine—all neurotransmitters, or chemicals that act as messengers between brain cells.

Infatuation

Suppose you are in a committed relationship and you're on the cusp of being involved in a limerent affair. In that case, the infatuation stage is when you first make the decision of whether or not to begin the affair.

First, affairs are often a replication waiting to happen. And second, affairs are often forged with the same magnetic power that a marriage is, often rendering the affair as hard to break as a marriage. Thus, ending an affair, especially if it is long-term, may resemble a divorce.

How long does the average affair last? While some infidelities may only last one night, others can drag on for years. The average affair, however, usually lasts about 6 months before finally fizzling out.

Nowadays, some therapists believe there are times when an affair can rescue a marriage or relationship and even make it stronger. Starting to understand how an affair happened can provide clarity and give answers to the many questions a couple may feel are still unanswered.

A 2021 survey by Health Testing Centers polled 441 people and reported: a little over 46% of respondents in a monogamous relationship said they had affairs.

Generally, texts and emails are private. Thus, you don't have a right to look at them without your spouse's consent. Doing so is viewed as an invasion of privacy. It doesn't matter whether you are married, separated or divorced.

The main reason people engage in long-term affairs when both parties are married is that they are unhappy in their marriages. If their husband or wife doesn't prioritize or value them, or fights and arguments are frequent, being with someone else is very enticing.

Micro-cheating is of course not a psychological term. It is simply an internet-friendly shorthand for describing one partner testing the limits of partnership by creating intimacy with someone else, yet without veering into a sexual relationship with them. And it's surprisingly common.

What is God's punishment for adultery? ›

"`If a man commits adultery with another man's wife--with the wife of his neighbor--both the adulterer and the adulteress must be put to death. "`If a man sleeps with his father's wife, he has dishonored his father. Both the man and the woman must be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads.

Coming to the question of how many affairs are discovered, a survey by IllicitEncounters.com (a dating site for extramarital affairs) revealed that 63% of cheaters have been caught at some point.

Men officially fantasise about cheating on their partner more than women. New research shows more men fantasise about cheating on their partners than women, with a scandalous 83.4 per cent confessing to getting off thinking about being unfaithful.

Yes, they do. Or they wouldn't be in a long-term relationship with their mistresses. Some men have mistresses for years, and it's not because they want just sex, they have true and lasting feelings for their lovers and feelings are difficult to shut off.

Yet, most affairs usually end one of two ways: with divorce or a stronger current relationship. How the end plays out is up to you, how you choose to react, and how hard you want to work to stay together. Learning how to overcome grief and pain is going to be difficult, but Couples Academy can help.

In some cases, it stems from unmet needs in a relationship. Issues like lack of communication, boredom, and personal insecurities can fester when they're not fully addressed. If one partner feels like they're never listened to or respected in their primary relationship, they may look for that in another person.

The researchers put it this way: Cheating is associated with feelings of self-satisfaction, and the boost in positive affect from cheating persists even when prospects for self-deception about unethical behavior are reduced.

According to WebMD, the “in love” stage of an affair lasts 6 to 18 months, on average. And around 75% of the marriages that start as affairs end in divorce. Considering only 5 to 7% of affair relationships lead to marriage, that's a grim statistic for couples hoping their affairs will last forever.

Experts say it's a phenomenon called "affair fog," which occurs when the person engaging in an affair is hyperfocused on the excitement of a new relationship and cannot properly understand the mistake they are making.

How do you space after an affair? ›

American Psychological Association research found that 20-40% of divorces are caused by an affair. The discovery of an affair may trigger a divorce, but there were likely problems in the marriage before the affair. When marital problems are not addressed, unhappy spouses may turn to someone outside the relationship.

Moving Forward

By working through the 3 stages of affair recovery—atonement, attunement, and attachment, couples can find healing from infidelity. If you're in a marriage where there's been infidelity, marriage counseling is going to be an important part of your healing process.

Recognize your grief as a normal process that you are moving through. The research tells us that well over 60% of couples struggling with infidelity never divorce. Recovery from infidelity is possible, even likely in many cases.

Experts say it's possible for couples to go on to have a happy relationship after infidelity, provided they're willing to put in the work. “The couple can survive and grow after an affair,” says Coleman.

They have low self-esteem. This trait is a known risk factor for cheating, and often for these people, cheating can be a coping mechanism and an attempted means to feel validated, desired and needed.

In the wake of the discovery of an affair, you are likely to experience a wide range of thoughts and feelings, ranging from numb (non-feeling) to feeling completely out of control and 'crazy'. This is the result of Post Infidelity Stress Disorder (PISD).

How do you deal with an ongoing affair? ›

The one thing all cheaters have in common is a lack of impulse control. Unfortunately, they also tend to be opportunistic and have an inflated sense of their own importance. What is this? Not only do serial cheaters adopt similar behavioral habits, but they also share a number of personality traits.

There are many reasons for infidelity such as revenge, boredom, the thrill of sexual novelty, sexual addiction. But experts say that a large majority of the time, motivations differ by gender, with men searching for more sex or attention and women looking to fill an emotional void.