We recently sent out a batch of questions to our Formspring friends. One of these questions asked whether the recipient considered physical infidelity or emotional infidelity the greater offense. Our fellow bloggers have begun answering, and in light of their thoughtful answers we felt the need to address the topic as well.
I must state for the record that we don’t judge others for the nature of their relationships, whether faithful or otherwise. As much as it goes against all of the social conditioning that’s been drummed into our minds all our lives, someone else’s relationship is not sufficiently our business to pass judgment. We don’t like to make assumptions, and when we hear about an extramarital affair we acknowledge that there may be extenuating circumstances that justify or excuse the behavior. This is obviously not always the case, but perhaps it is. Keeping this possibility in mind, we don’t hurl epithets at cheaters who have not cheated on us personally. Thus, what follows applies to our relationship, and may not apply to any others.
Communication is one of the most important components of our marriage. We keep no secrets from each other, nor do we want any. Beyond the fact that I’m notoriously lousy at keeping secrets from my wife, being completely honest helps further the notion that the openness of our relationship – to the extent that it is open; it really isn’t – exists to bring us closer together as a couple, as has always been our goal. That means that if you and I have ever exchanged a sexy IM conversation, Jill probably read it after the fact. And you probably inspired some really hot sex, so thanks!
We have a very low tolerance for infidelity of any kind. It’s not because the thought of our partner being physically intimate with another person hurts us; far from that. It’s because “infidelity” refers to a lack of loyalty exemplified by hiding something or otherwise stepping outside the limits that we have set for ourselves and each other. We consider this unacceptable. Because of this, we consider any infidelity, whether physical or emotional, to be something from which we might be incapable of recovering. At the very least, while it would hopefully be easy enough to address the fact that there is a deficiency in our relationship, we imagine that we would have a difficult time picking up the pieces, so to speak, and repairing what is broken.
We suspect that many people aren’t even aware of emotional infidelity as a concept. There are those who are so hung up on physical infidelity and what an egregious offense it is in the context of a monogamous relationship that very little heed is paid to emotional infidelity. But it can be just as severe a threat to a relationship as physical cheating, if not moreso.
Last year, GoodWill (or is it BadWill?) posted that while he is completely faithful to his wife physically, the fact that he has a blog through which he flirts with women, and in doing so manages to compensate for what is lacking in his marriage, makes him a hypocrite. We disagreed somewhat; he’s a man in an unfortunate situation, married to a woman whose sex drive and interest level don’t come close to matching his own. In flirting with women in a relatively safe online environment, he’s doing what he needs to do in order to remain physically faithful to his wife. But judging by what we suspect to be his wife’s standards he has certainly been emotionally unfaithful.
A friend of mine once got dumped by his girlfriend, who met another guy while my friend was on a trip overseas. My friend was upset by this development, but he thought he could somehow save the relationship as long as his girlfriend hadn’t had sex with the other guy. In his mind, if there had been no physical intimacy, he could undermine whatever emotional connection existed and get her back. The emotional connection she’d made with another guy wasn’t a threat – or perhaps hadn’t even occurred to him. But once he found out that they’d had sex, he no longer wanted to save the relationship. In his mind, it was irreparably broken; there was nothing left to save.
That struck me as odd: If the girl had fallen in love with the new guy, everything would have been okay with my friend as long as the relationship hadn’t been consummated physically. I was much younger, somewhat insecure, and well aware of what an unforgivable breach physical infidelity was. But even then I felt that to give emotion such short shrift, and to consider one’s girlfriend falling in love with another person a minor stumbling block at most, seemed very short-sighted.
Again, we consider emotional infidelity and physical infidelity equally serious offenses. But to us, sex is not exactly sacred. We’ve both had sex with people who meant nothing to us. However, the people we’ve loved or been in love with belong to a much more exclusive group. Most people don’t get to join that group. In our opinion love, much more than sex, is not something to be taken for granted or given away lightly. Therefore, were Jill to find herself drawn to another person emotionally – i.e., in a fashion previously reserved for me – I would rightfully see this as a threat to our relationship. My wife doesn’t give her love easily. If she feels a strong emotional connection to someone else, she must be serious about it.
More importantly, I know that if Jill has these feelings for someone else, it’s because I have failed to satisfy her emotional needs as I’ve always promised I would. I’m reasonably certain that despite my shortcomings, including my wandering eye that frequently lands on her friends, sisters and cousins, I’ll never neglect her emotions, certainly not to this point. For Jill, falling in love with someone else is an absolute last resort that occurs when crying, alcohol, and emotionless sex no longer help fill the void.
That’s not to say that we’ll fuck anything that comes into our line of sight. But we’re more likely to have emotionless sex with someone who is not our partner (with our partner’s blessing, obviously) than we are to give away our hearts. Our hearts are already spoken for. Sex can be meaningless, but to us at least, love never is. We would feel betrayed if the other had sex with someone else without our express consent. While such a betrayal would seriously undermine our relationship, it is more likely that we could recover from physical infidelity than emotional infidelity.
-Jack
I know we have talked about this before and I just answered this on my blog too so I agree with you guys. Physical infidelity is something that I would be able to get over but emotional infidelity is something I couldn’t imagine myself being able to overcome and part of the reasoning in my head at least is… that I wasn’t enough. Physically I can wrap my head around everyone being different needing something different but to tell me I am not fullfilling emotional needs would be too overwhelming to come back from. Of course my post was not as well written but… It serves its point none the less.
As you said infidelity comes in many guises and has many excuses and reasons for existing.
In our relationship we are honest all the time. That is our one steadfast rule.
Our marraige will always be our primary relationship but we don’t pretend that the sex we share with other people doesn’t carry some level of emotional connection. Sometimes it is merely the warmth of shared orgasms but sometimes it runs deeper. I believe it is unreasonable to expect one person to supply all emotional needs to you and as such it is healthy to cultivate a wide range of relationships from friends, to lovers.
For us the fidelity is in the honesty. At all times you must tell honestly and listen honestly. If that doesn’t happen then we are in trouble.
We also recognise that our rules are not other people’s rules and so we have learned not to judge others when we see them doing something we don’t agree with. There is always at least three aspects to a situation between two people. Rarely are you privvy to all of them and so a fair judgement cannot be made.
Excellently put. It was a great question that got our brains working, and I agree with your view as well.
I agree that emotional trumps the physical, but since I’ve never had sex without the emotional connection, I’m not sure that I can or could or would have sex without some form of love.
Its funny I say that, since I want a “girlfriend” that I can have girl-girl fun with on the side… but it would be with someone I have a connection, I couldn’t just do a craigslist posting. My wheels are spinning.
As with the other commenters, I agree that emotional fidelity is just as important as physical fidelity. To ignore the emotions commection is foolish and short-sighted.
My only possible concern with your comment that the emotional trumps the physical is that there are chemicals at work in our bodies, and in our brains when we have sex, when we touch someone, when we have an orgasm. These chemicals directly affect our emotions. I am not sure that sex can occur without some emotional consequences.
I am certainly not the expert, but I am sure there are different levels of emotions involved. However, it may be difficult to separate the physical entirely in this way.
Just a thought…I would love to hear what your thoughts are on this.
Emotional connection to me is as important if not more then physical. It carries more pain to be wounded emotionally I believe because this is someone you trusted with your secrets, usually that being one of them, and still made a choice to seek confidences with another. I would rather him be honest about it all, then lie to me, and allow us a chance to work on it.
I completely agree that emotional infidelity is worse than physical. But I can see why many people can’t get over the physical. For me, and Scotty too, sex only happens when I have deep and intimate feelings for someone. So the physical and emotional go hand in hand for me. The emotional would hurt me worse in the end, but because I know the physical wouldn’t happen without the emotional, it don’t think I could get over either.
Fascinating post. I have made the mistake of committing emotional, non-physical infidelity on my partner not so long ago.. I felt so guilty about it, about the betrayal of trust (amongst a plethora of other negative emotions).. that I told her. Needless to say it led to the immediate break down of our relationship..
In my opinion the non-physical carries far more weight, cuts deeper, and leaves longer lasting scars.
I agree that physical connections/indiscretions can happen without involvement, but emotional ones take place on a whole other level.
I’m totally with you guys, infidelity is something that isn’t really acceptable, it shows a lack of loyalty and trust. Now if everyone is aware of things going on and are okay with that, that’s a different case entirely. An extremely well thought out post, and I think I’ll have to answer that question this week for Formspring Friday.
I can only speak for myself. Guilty of being both, emotionally & phsyically unfaithful. No excuses. The sex has NO emotional connection. We (he & I) made sure of that, tho I think we both experience a bit of emotional connection, we try to quickly put out that flame, its all about the meaningless physical contact for us.
I feel that being emotionally unfaithful is a bit more serious. We spoke of so much, deep dark secrets & desires. We spoke everyday, sometimes for hours at a time. We are going on 4yrs, but our relationship has changed. The feelings are NOT the same, tho the connection is there. We have learned that it was wrong, our spouses knew, hell my hubby knew before I did. I was in denial. My spouse viewed it as no harm done, he understood I was at a low point in my life. I needed something outside, like a drug to make me feel better.
I think I am one of the lucky ones, to be married to a man, who understands some of whats going on in my being. I wouldnt trade him for anything or anyone, tho I wish I could “behave” myself more than I do.
Integrity only happens when there is complete honesty.
I am surprised to not see an entry from Master Michael, as he feels very strongly about honesty and integrity.
The biggest reward is complete trust and faith in the relationship, and you can’t put a price on that