What does emotional cheating mean to you.

I was raised in a family of a ratio of 5 males to 1 female. Grew up with uncles, had 3 sons.
I feel men friends play less games and are more honest than many female friends.
I can have great non physical relationship with males.
Emotional, if that entails caring about another person that it over rides how much you care for
your partner, then it has went too far.
If the other person is attempting to take up more of your time, and keep you to them self.. too far.

I am not sure every couple can live with their partner spending time with others, same sex or not.
Loads of trust involved in that and never asking your partner to join in, no matter if they are not interested
in what you and your friend have planned, is just wrong. They need to have the choice.
 
Psychologists say that when a couple has their first child, the husband feels the loss of the wife's attention as she is preoccupied with the baby. That's when a husband is vulnerable to the attention of women at work. He misses the intimacy of the relationship he had with his wife. That's when affairs can ignite from unmet needs.

The odd thing is that it looks like friendship and because both parties are young and attractive, they can find themselves attracted to each other in much the same way as they were with their spouse.

If they end up seeing each other outside work and in more physically intimate ways, then there is a problem in the marriage.

If they just talk at work but have private fantasies, they are surprised to find them. But like @Aunt Bea said, you manage your feelings and come to your senses and get back to work.

I've had some very attractive women want to get to know me when I was young and it was flattering and I wondered if it would be good with them but I distinguished them from my wife since she was the real deal in terms of commitment.

It's a learning experience and you learn how and what it means to remain committed.
 
I have no experience with it. When I'm in a relationship with a woman, I just don't have any desire for emotional intimacy with anyone else. Good friends or buddies is OK, but my most intimate and tender thoughts are always about my partner.

I guess it's always possible, but I can't imagine a significant other sharing intimate emotions with someone else.
If this were to happen, I would think there would already be signs of trouble in one's relationship.
 
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  • Myth: If there’s no sex, it’s harmless.
  • Fact: Sharing your deepest thoughts and feelings outside the relationship can be just as intimate and damaging.
  • Infidelity often starts in the heart long before it reaches with a person outside of your relationship that threatens the commitment, trust, and intimacy of your primary relationship.







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I think situations like that sometimes develop when things have gone cold in the relationship between 2 married partners (or "signifanct others") and one of them turns to a sympathetic ear outside of the primary relationship. It may seem to the offender they are just seeking advice of comfort, and therefore, it's harmless, but it has dangerous potential.
 
MACKTEXAS said:
I think situations like that sometimes develop when things have gone cold in the relationship between 2 married partners (or "signifanct others") and one of them turns to a sympathetic ear outside of the primary relationship. It may seem to the offender they are just seeking advice of comfort, and therefore, it's harmless, but it has dangerous potential.
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So it is. This happened to one of my cousins. Ultimately it led to a divorce with his wife and marriage with the female neighbor next door who also was 15 years younger.
 
MACKTEXAS said:
I think situations like that sometimes develop when things have gone cold in the relationship between 2 married partners (or "signifanct others") and one of them turns to a sympathetic ear outside of the primary relationship. It may seem to the offender they are just seeking advice of comfort, and therefore, it's harmless, but it has dangerous potential.
Click to expand...
I agree it does happen, to many. There are things you just don't talk about outside your partner. Your partner should always be the one
you can talk to with open heart about everything. I don't even cross that line with female friends let alone male ones. I expect the same
from him, which he has proven over and over again also. It would hurt me deeply to learn he had been leaning on someone else and I
had no idea. So I sure wouldn't do that to him. My Mom would question me about things and all she got was... not your problem Mom.
 
Here is an example of emotional cheating:

Commandment #9:
“Thou shall not covet thy neighbor’s wife.” Meaning that we shall not desire or lust after the neighbor’s wife or another person’s spouse.
 
While I can see how it could cross a line, it is a personal choice or flaw to step over a line.

This is what labeling something "cheating " does. It is one of those words all seem to have a reaction to. I hate labels for this reason.

In reality this has been blown out of proportion. I have had friends of opposite sex my whole life it was not a threat or problem with my spouse, and I never had a problem with him and female co-workers etc.

I am on a different type of forum with many young people, and far too many now think a partner cannot even talk to others.... only them. That is unrealistic and just creates fake drama.
So many lose their mind that a boy or girl texted someone they have interest in and they act as if the world is imploding.
 
Emotional cheating/infidelity implies that trust has been broken.

Sexual infidelity is more clearly defined because it’s a physical thing and the violated trust is more obvious, while emotional infidelity is more subjective, more open to interpretation.

Forming a deep and meaningful emotional connection outside of the committed relationship can threaten or break the trust of that primary bond, but again, it’s subjective depending on how the partners in the committed relationship define their boundaries regarding emotional intimacy.

In emotional intimacy the one may feel they’ve don’t nothing wrong while the other may feel violated, compared to physical intimacy in which the boundaries, and their violations, are more obvious.

Ron has two women friends that he’s known for most of his life, and he’s very close with them, though they don’t live near. They’ve known him far longer than I have, have a long history together, have seen each other through failed marriages, work upheavals, kid issues, spousal death, etc. He tells them he loves them at the end of each conversation or visit as they do him.

I don’t feel threatened, don’t feel violated, am not jealous. In part that’s because I’m not an insecure person, but it’s also because Ron has never kept the way he feels about these women a secret from me. He’s completely open, talks to them in front of me/on speaker, I’ve met both of them and consider them friends.

If I were less secure as a person I guess I might feel jealous, or feel threatened by the emotional bond he has with them. I might consider his closeness with them cheating.

I honestly don’t think it’s ever occurred to him that those relationships are inappropriate now that he’s married to me. And for my part, I don’t feel that any trust has been broken by him continuing those friendships, so we’re good.

As mentioned before, emotional closeness and whether or not it can be damaging to a relationship is a very subjective thing.
 
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