Can you maintain a friendship with someone you had an affair with while trying to fix your marriage?

In My Humble Opinion
41

In answer to the OP: no. The fact that she had sex with this guy and the fact that you both agreed to an open-relationship have nothing to do with this question. If you two are truly trying to rebuild your marriage, then neither of you can have such a strong friendship with anyone but each other. If you convince yourself otherwise, then you will guarantee failure. And since he is such a good counsel, the 3rd party should understand this and get out of the way.

With the sort of problems you are describing, it is unlikely that either of you is responsible for more than 50% of the blame. Assigning more blame to the other person is an obvious recipe for disaster, but assigning yourself more than 50% is really just as bad. Neither party can start with the moral high-ground.

One easy thing you should do is quickly get interested in the following:

Finally, I think the posts by Heart of Dorkness and Hamshire were very well put.

Good luck!

42

I think you may be overly relying on the word chemical, Asimovian. there are many kinds of love, and many sources of it. The physiological “wow, i want to hit that” reaction is really sensitive to all sorts of random shit (which is why it’s a crappy thing to use as a basis for a relationship). Are you sure this isn’t “you’ve lost that loving feeling” rather than a semi-permanent state? If it’s the former, a steady diet of fun times and hot sex might make a world of difference.

I’ve noticed that my own brain chemistry is highly malleable in this regard, assuming that I’m attracted to the person at all. Not sure how it works for the rest of humanity though.

43

It may be a moot point now, as your lady has agreed to sever ties to Friend, but I couldn’t do it.

I was spouse A, and I attached myself to a close friend because I didn’t want to leave DH but was desperately lonely. I tried to maintain some sort of relationship with Friend, because I felt guilty for dragging him into the mess I had created. But I was too dependant on him emotionally to be able to have any contact with him while working on relationship with DH. So I had to walk away. It was a train wreck.

Asmovian, Don’t beat yourself up for not understanding her signals. The Love Languages book will give you insight, and I second your endorsement, but as humans we are each responsible for communicating that we need something – even if we cannot articulate precisely what we do need. Unless your lady begged you to go to counseling for months and you refused (I tried for 6 months in my case), cut yourself some slack.

44

Cheating doesn’t always have to be about having sex. It can be about sharing things other than your genitals with another person that you should be sharing with your spouse.

An “open relationship” only works when the relationship is stable to begin with. If it’s just a way to dodge issues, it’s only going to make things worse.

45

No effing way.

46

anu-la1979, I know that when I ran into you was very close in timing to when this all happened, but I think we chatted beforehand. I definitely wasn’t trying to keep you out of the loop. I will take you up on your offer soon – our office is moving up the street at the end of this week, but when we’re settled in a couple of weeks, you and I can get together. Thank you for the offer! As for the “settling” issue, I’ve raised that with her several times. She seems pretty confident that that ISN’T what she’s doing here (although she’s obviously changed her mind about several things throughout this process). I agree that her settling for less than what makes her happy is going to end up being bad for both of us in the end. But for now, all I can focus on is what’s going to make ME happy, and I have to let her worry about her own shit for the time being.

Mom-of-Andrew, she was actually the one who wanted to avoid counseling at first. We went a few years back briefly to work on some communication issues, and it helped some, but she was very anti-counseling in general. There finally reached a point about a year and a half ago where she was willing and wanted me to go to try to hash out some issues, but I ended up not following through on it. My bad, definitely, but I also felt like she wasn’t serious about it because she had been so against it before, and because she wasn’t willing to come with me.

Even now, when I’ve tried to convince her that she needs counseling as much as I do, she is very resistant. We went twice together before the separation, and now I’m going on my own right now. Her form of counseling is solitude, journaling, and playing her guitar. I’m not saying she isn’t able to make progress on getting her head straight that way, but I still wish she was seeking professional help.

47

Oh, that’s not what I meant at all-more like, if I had known you were going through this I would have been more supportive or taken you out for a beer right then and there instead of running away muppet style screaming “GMAT in 2 days, smell ya later!”

Like I said, when you’re feeling up to it, let me know and we’ll go to the Standard for a recuperative brewski or catchup or whatever. Best of luck with the counselling.

48

Then ISTM that it is important to her.

I have not been in your position. But after thirteen years together, I don’t find it surprising that there is less “raw, chemical reaction” than at the beginning. IME after a certain number of years, the physical attraction is differently based than it was early on. Which is both good news and bad news. The bad news is that it is not going to be like it was in the first couple of years… The good news is that it doesn’t have to be like it was in the first couple of years.

YMMV, void where taxes or prohibited, professional driver on closed course, kids, get your parent’s permission before calling, etc.

Regards,
Shodan

49

I missed this earlier and wanted to address it in case it’s relevant to anyone.

According to her (and I believe it because I’ve always felt it from her), she has NEVER felt that way towards me. She loved me in spite of it, and partially because we got together so young that she didn’t realize she was capable of feeling that for anyone. She just thought that’s how it was supposed to be, up until she ended up with the recent guys she’s slept with. So now she knows she’s capable of feeling that raw spark with someone – just not me. And she has been rather insistent that she does think I am physically attractive. I just don’t cause the same spark in her on sight that she does for me.

So it’s not that she’s lost some sexual attraction for me. It has always been this way. And she claims that despite knowing now that it is possible for her to feel that spark for someone else, it isn’t worth trading for everything that she and I have in our marriage.

I hope that is somewhat clarifying.

50

Same here. We started out in couple’s therapy, but DH is also a mental health professional and had a higher level of certification that the counseler. Guy was intimidated by DH and sessions ended up being, 'What’s wrong with MoA? Then DH decided guy wasn’t doing any good and I should find a therapist on my own, as I was the one who needed to be ‘fixed’. :rolleyes:

I found a therapist with a certification that DH would respect, and I went alone. It was remarkably helpful for a while. I was able to get him to come with me a couple of times to tell him stuff that I didn’t have the courage to say on my own.

I’m not in therapy currently, but I do use friends as a sounding board for things. And I come here (especially to the Pit) when I need my ears pinned back over something. Introspection can be useful, but you really need an outside opinion now and then to keep you from the minutia of your own navel lint.

Perhaps you could point out that SO was using Friend as a sounding board, and now that she has stopped talking to Friend she might try counseling? Even peer counseling might give her some perspective.

51

I can only speak from my experience. I recently got out of a clusterfuck of a marriage myself (almost two years, now), and, while there were a lot of things that were similar, there were a lot that were different.

If you do want to continue the marriage, and the infidelity was considered infidelity only because of the emotional connection, then, no, Spouse A cannot continue having the emotional connection with the affair-person. It’s not fair to Spouse B (you), because it’s allowing the betrayal to continue. It’s not fair to the affair-person, either, because they’re going to end up wanting something they can never have. And it’s not fair to Spouse A because, even if she does nothing untowards and has killed all feelings for this guy, she’s never going to be able to walk away from the suspicion unless she walks away from him.

I personally believe that sexual attraction is an important part of marriage. It doesn’t have to be that you think the person is the most physically attractive person ever, but they have to be able to do it for you. They have to give you that zing, that spark, that bit of excitement. Maybe not every minute of every day–I have days where Nathan Fillion could offer to do horrible, wonderful things to me, and I’d be like, meh–but as a baseline for most of those interactions. If that’s not present, and the person has any sort of attraction for anyone else, it’s going to go very, very badly.

And it’s not fair to the person, either, because, honestly, sex where you’re not sure the other person’s really into it is the most nerve-wracking thing freaking ever.

I don’t see it working long-term. But, if there’s even going to be a ghost of a chance, the spare’s gotta go.

52

I just wanted to point out that you just summed up my sex life for the last twelve years or so. She could never understand how I could claim to be so attracted to her, and yet not be interested in having sex all that often. I wasn’t realizing it consciously until recently, but that was it. It’s very difficult to want to have sex with someone when you don’t really feel like the person is all that interested in you sexually.

I suspect that we can work through everything else that has happened to this point, but how each of us deals with that one issue is probably going to make or break the marriage.

And I will now scold myself, as my counselor has told me that I need to get out of the prediction business and just focus on making myself the best person I can be and worry about the relationship later.

53

So long as Spouse A is also working to become a better person. The blame for this is certainly not all on your shoulders, though there are times it sounds like you think it is. Wish i had better advice.

As a computer geek, I think you’ll appreciate an xkcd reference even if it strikes rather close to home:

54

Heh…I’m a big fan of XKCD, and hadn’t remembered that one. Yeah, that one does kinda hurt, but it’s still funny. :slight_smile:

55

AMEN Sister! As much as I’d like to believe I cold deal with it, under the guidelines you suggest, NO GD WAY. Immature, maybe. But if you want to work it out with me the entirety of your emotional relationships had better be with me.

56

There are no children in the mix to complicate things, are there? (just curious)

57

No children, thankfully. This thing is far too complicated as it is.

58

Oh, THANK GOD! I was terrified that in the midst of all this screwing around, and navel gazing about ‘chemical attraction’ and angst about 'working on the marriage :rolleyes:" there was some poor kid who needed, you know, parents.

59

My best sex and makeout sessions have not been with the guys with whom I had that chemistry. Matter of fact, the best makeout session ever was with a guy for which I felt very little “chemistry”: I did find him attractive after we started talking, but it wasn’t my nose leading the way, it was my ears. And one of the two guys with whom the chemistry was strongest? Worst lay of my life, as he was a self-centered git.

Mileage will, of course, vary.

60

Well, I’m not really talking about instant, animal spark; my favorite sex and kissing’s not been with the person I was most attracted to initially physically.

I mean wanting to make sure that they want to be there, that they want to be doing it, that they’re into you. It doesn’t have to be combustion, but you have to be reasonably certain that the other person wants to be there. At least, it’s that way for me. If I have to second guess whether the other person’d rather be, say, organizing his DVDs, then that ruins it for me.