Quotes About Infidelity

Infidelity hurts. But when we grant it a special status in the hierarchy of marital misdemeanors, we risk allowing it to overshadow the egregious behaviors that may have preceded it or even led to it.

despite its widespread denunciation, infidelity has a tenacity that marriage can only envy.

People stray for a multitude of reasons, and every time I think I have heard them all, a new variation emerges. But one theme comes up repeatedly: affairs as a form of self-discovery, a quest for a new (or a lost) identity. For these seekers, infidelity is less likely to be a symptom of a problem, and is more often described as an expansive experience that involves growth, exploration, and transformation.

What for Partner A may have been agonizing betrayal was transformative for Partner B. Understanding why the infidelity happened and what it signified is critical, both for couples who choose to end their relationship and for those who want to stay together, rebuild, and revitalize theirs.

Monogamy is the sacred cow of the romantic ideal, for it confirms our specialness. Infidelity says, You're not so special after all. It shatters the grand ambition of love.

But in a culture that mandates individual fulfillment and lures us with the promise of being happier, never have we been more tempted to stray. Perhaps this is why we condemn infidelity more than ever even as we practice it more than ever.

Understanding infidelity does not mean justifying it.

Secrets and lies are at the heart of every affair, and they heighten both the excitement of the lovers and the pain of the betrayed.

Adultery has existed since marriage was invented, and so too has the taboo against it. It has been legislated, debated, politicized, and demonized throughout history.

Yet despite its widespread denunciation, infidelity has a tenacity that marriage can only envy.

Marriage has become a mythical castle, designed to be everything we could want. Affairs bring it tumbling down, leaving us feeling like there is nothing to hold on to. Perhaps this goes some way toward explaining why modern infidelity is more than painful. It is traumatic.

Infidelity happens in good marriages, in bad marriages, and even when adultery is punishable by death. It happens in open relationships where extramarital sex is carefully negotiated beforehand. And the freedom to leave or divorce has not made cheating obsolete.

Women cheat for love, the common assumption goes, but men? They cheat for sex. And this assumption is all the more strongly reinforced when the sex in question is anonymous, transactional, or commercial.

The emotional resonance between his relationship with his parents and his relationship with his wife is so strong that it leads to an unfortunate cross-wiring. Hence, the feeling that sex is "wrong," almost incestuous. When a partner starts to feel too familial, sex will inevitably be the casualty. Ironic as it may seem, at that moment the taboo of infidelity feels less transgressive than sex at home.

Defining adultery is at once quite simple and quite complicated. Today, in the West, relationship ethics are no longer dictated by religious authority. The definition of infidelity no longer resides with the Pope, but with the people. This means more freedom, as well as more uncertainty. Couples must draw up their own terms.

Adultery has existed since marriage was invented, and so too has the taboo against it. It has been legislated, debated, politicized, and demonized throughout history. Yet despite its widespread denunciation, infidelity has a tenacity that marriage can only envy.

Secrecy is the number one organizing principle of an infidelity. An affair always lives in the shadow of the primary relationship, hoping never to be discovered. The secrecy is precisely what intensifies the erotic charge. "Sex and subterfuge make a delicious cocktail,"7 writes journalist Julia Keller.

Affairs are an act of betrayal and they are also an expression of longing and loss.

While emotional transparency is touted everywhere as the crux of modern intimacy, I am amazed at the paucity of real sexual communication between partners. Part of my work in post-infidelity involves direct coaching as to how, why, where, and when to talk about sex.

Sexual honesty isn't just about divulging the details of your infidelities. It's about communicating with your partner in an open and mature way—revealing core aspects of yourself through your sexuality.

As for the general public, we tend to judge the "other woman" far more harshly than the cheating husband.

I have met plenty of men who were the lovers of married women (or married men, for that matter). But I have yet to meet a man who was single and gave his love to another man's wife for thirty years, hoping that she would leave and come and make a family with him.

For me, infidelity includes one or more of these three constitutive elements: secrecy, sexual alchemy, and emotional involvement.

Emotional involvement is the third element that may play a role in infidelity. Most affairs register an emotional component, to one degree or another.