There are many parallels between in-person affairs and Internet affairs. Often, they both start innocently enough. In fact, the first steps are usually deceptively simple. Who would believe that the simple exchange of friendly e-mails could result in divorce and the consequent disruption in the lives of children? Most people never step back to consider the implications of what they are doing. They don't realize that they can use the same precautions that protect committed relationships from in-person affairs to protect them from Internet affairs.

Quiz: Is Your On-line Friendship Too Friendly?

What are the warning signs that you (or your partner) are on the slippery slope to an on-line affair? Take this on-line relationship quiz and see.21Directions: Circle Yes or No to the left of each statement.

[image]Scoring Key:Two or more yes answers to questions 1, 2, 3, 4 indicate a potential Internet romance is developing. It is time to either share your on-line correspondence with your mate or break off the correspondence and begin to examine how to improve your marriage.A yes answer to any of questions 5, 6, 7 indicates you are crossing the boundary from an Internet friendship to an Internet romance. Acknowledge this relationship for what it is about to become and take action to preserve and enhance your marriage.A yes answer to question 8 or 9 indicates you have begun a fantasy romantic relationship with your on-line correspondent. Even if it never moves to a physical stage, this relationship has great potential to damage or destroy your marriage.A yes answer to question 10 or 11 indicates that you have taken positive action toward initiating an extramarital affair. Consider the impact this will have on your marriage and your children and take steps to sort this out with a professional.

The Prevention Myth Often after an affair comes to light, outside observers will speculate unfairly and ignorantly that the betrayed wife must have been reluctant or inadequate in the bedroom, or that the husband of an unfaithful wife was spending too much time at work, and this explains the affair. Just as uninformed gossips often blame inadequacies or weaknesses in the betrayed partner, women are more p.r.o.ne than men to blame themselves for their partner's infidelity. They think if only they had been more desirable (loving, available, competent, s.e.xy, slender ... ), the affair would never have happened.

This is what I call the Prevention Myth, which states that a loving partner and a good marriage will prevent affairs. This misconception is not supported by any research, even though it is commonly cited as fact on television shows and in popular books about how to affair-proof your marriage. Any advice based on this bad a.s.sumption and simplification of a complex issue is misleading. The fact is, sometimes an affair can be understood by exploring deficiencies in the marriage, but often it cannot. If you don't examine all the factors that contribute to an affair, you cannot know. Sometimes the explanation is as simple as attraction, opportunity, and failure to follow precautions. Sometimes it is more complex than that.

Avoiding Fatal Attractions Most of us would not want to live in a world where we didn't feel some magnetic attraction to other people. But it does make sense to develop a personal strategy for protecting yourself and your relationships from the fallout of acting on such impulses. People who know how to safeguard a long-term relationship may not be able to say exactly how they do it, but you can be sure that they follow, consciously or unconsciously, these basic guidelines: - Know that attraction is normal. But just because you feel it doesn't mean you have to act on it. Being attracted to someone else doesn't mean that you've chosen to be with the wrong person. One of the measures of true commitment is that you don't allow yourself to be pulled away from your priorities by distractions.

In the movie Six Days Seven Nights, the heroine, played by Anne Heche, breaks off her engagement after a week of being stranded with Harrison Ford on a tropical island where they have faced all kinds of dangers. She believes that if her fiance had been the right person for her, she would never have been attracted to someone else. What a ridiculous a.s.sumption! What woman in her right mind wouldn't feel an attraction to a heroic figure like Harrison Ford?

- Don't let yourself fantasize about what it would be like to be with that other person. Affairs begin in the mind. The prelude usually involves imagining yourself alone ... satisfying the curiosity ... savoring the closeness ... antic.i.p.ating the excitement.

- Don't flirt. To look is human, but flirting signals that you are available. You've sent out an invitation of receptivity and are ready to see who says yes.

- Avoid risky situations. After a skiing accident, former president Clinton never went skiing again. He should have shown similar caution when Monica Lewinsky flirted with him.

In the next chapter, you'll learn how to tell the difference between an emotional affair and a platonic friendship. You will see how emotional affairs intensify when they cross the threshold of s.e.xual intimacy, and how leading a double life requires a balancing act that eventually begins to take its toll.

2.

CROSSING INTO A DOUBLE LIFE.

We didn't plan it. After a year of getting closer and closer, it happened. We fell into each other's arms, and there we were-kissing.

ALMOST EVERY newly married couple expects their relationship to be monogamous. They begin their lives together never imagining that one or both of them would come to consider infidelity acceptable. newly married couple expects their relationship to be monogamous. They begin their lives together never imagining that one or both of them would come to consider infidelity acceptable.1 They probably don't know, however, that pledging themselves to exclusivity will not protect them from thinking, feeling, and doing things they don't want anyone to know about. Even if, during the course of their marriage, they are unfaithful, they may continue to profess monogamy as a value (particularly for their spouse). While they are involved in their affair, they will carry on two different lives: one in public and the other in private. Depending on how careful they are, these two streams will run in parallel channels but will not mix. They probably don't know, however, that pledging themselves to exclusivity will not protect them from thinking, feeling, and doing things they don't want anyone to know about. Even if, during the course of their marriage, they are unfaithful, they may continue to profess monogamy as a value (particularly for their spouse). While they are involved in their affair, they will carry on two different lives: one in public and the other in private. Depending on how careful they are, these two streams will run in parallel channels but will not mix.

Some people begin an affair because of s.e.xual attraction and jump right into s.e.x. But most women and an increasing number of men begin with an emotional connection without any thought of a s.e.xual relationship. They spend time talking and getting to know each other. They delight in their companionship without worrying too much about where it's heading. As they become more intrigued by their friendship, more of their emotional energy is directed away from the marriage.

Step 3: Emotionally Involved Affair/ Emotionally Detached Marriage Ralph and Lara were beginning to understand that their relationship was more than just a fond friendship. They were aware that they had developed a separate channel of communication and experience, apart from everybody else. They were becoming circ.u.mspect in public. Around their colleagues, they were careful not to indulge in any public displays of affection. They treated each other with a certain formality calculated to mask their easy intimacy. But they didn't fool anyone. The electricity between them sparked and crackled, and in the end they gave themselves away.

Far from the observant eyes of their colleagues, on the street or in a restaurant, they relaxed and engaged in a graceful ch.o.r.eography of gestures and body movements. They gazed into each other's eyes. They sat close together and touched each other lightly. They ate off of each other's plates. They finished each other's sentences, their emotions showing plainly through their hands and faces. Anybody looking at them would know they were enthralled with each other.

At home, Rachel told Ralph that she was concerned by some changes she was noticing. Ralph seemed different. He was spending more time at work, and he seemed less interested in the children. She pointed out, with worry in her voice, that he was extremely moody. When she asked him if something was wrong, he said, "Nothing's wrong." He rea.s.sured her by telling her how much pressure he was under to meet his sales quotas. He hugged her, and she believed him for the moment. But then he became distant again. She didn't trust her own instincts and mentally put herself down for being suspicious. Thank heaven she was able to focus her thoughts on the remodeling job they had started in the kitchen six months earlier. Staying busy kept her from brooding.

If we could have eavesdropped on Rachel's thoughts, this is what we would have heard: RACHEL: Although my gut tells me that something is wrong, I need to believe Ralph. I do wonder why he doesn't talk about Lara anymore, but when I ask him if something is going on with her, he says no. I know he's not the type of man to fool around. And he's always been honest with me. So I think I must be off base. But then I go back to trusting my own intuition, and I know something or someone has come between us. Maybe he's in some kind of trouble and is afraid to tell me. I wonder if it's my fault. I try to be extra caring and accommodating, but it doesn't seem to make a bit of difference. He still seems interested in s.e.x but is less affectionate and hardly ever kisses me when we are making love. I wonder if he's having health problems or money problems he doesn't want to tell me about. Knowing the worst would be better than not knowing at all.

As relationships become more intimate, people develop a truth bias in which they are more likely to judge their partners as truthful and less likely to detect deception.2

When Rachel raised questions about Lara, Ralph told her not to be so hyper, that she was jealous for no reason. He realized that he would have to be more careful about being nice to Rachel. But he was not good about keeping his resolution to make Rachel feel secure because he was so preoccupied with thoughts about Lara.

This is what Ralph was thinking: RALPH : I am so happy being with Lara. I feel so special when I'm with her because of the way she listens to me. We are completely tuned in to each other. I feel young and full of energy. I feel a little uncomfortable when I think about Rachel and the kids, so I try not to think about it. Besides, it doesn't really have anything to do with them. I'm not taking anything away from them. How could something innocent like this that makes me feel so good be a bad thing? : I am so happy being with Lara. I feel so special when I'm with her because of the way she listens to me. We are completely tuned in to each other. I feel young and full of energy. I feel a little uncomfortable when I think about Rachel and the kids, so I try not to think about it. Besides, it doesn't really have anything to do with them. I'm not taking anything away from them. How could something innocent like this that makes me feel so good be a bad thing?

Ralph had a clear conscience. He didn't think he and Lara were doing anything wrong. After all, he was still committed to Rachel. He hoped with all his heart that he could continue to maintain his stimulating relationship with Lara without endangering his marriage. He enjoyed the comfort and familiarity of marriage as well as the novelty and excitement he felt with Lara. Often, however, he thought about how much more fun Lara was. He loved how she looked up to him and put him on a pedestal.

As Ralph discovered, a compelling aspect of emotional affairs is the positive mirroring that occurs. We like how we see ourselves reflected in the other person's eyes. By contrast, in our long-term relationships, our reflection is like a 5x makeup mirror in which our flaws are magnified. In a new romance, our reflection is like the rosy glow of an illuminated vanity mirror.3 It is also important to note, however, that the magnetism of forbidden love gives the affair partner an intrinsic advantage when comparing the two relationships. It isn't that spouses are dull and troublesome and affair partners are brilliant and beautiful. Frank Pittman observed that the choice of an affair partner appears to be based on how that person differs from the spouse rather than any perceived superiority to the spouse.4 Ralph was convinced that his emotional tie to Lara was a good thing and was not affecting his marriage. His idea of what const.i.tutes an affair was related to his a.s.sumption that affairs are about having s.e.x. He felt safe because their relationship was based on a close friendship between two respectful human beings. Because their relationship wasn't s.e.xual, he didn't consider it a "real" affair.

Men are more likely than women to separate s.e.x and love. In my clinical sample, 26 percent of men and only 3 percent of women said they had had extramarital s.e.x without being emotionally involved.

Despite Ralph's traditional idea that s.e.x defines an affair, his actual behavior signifies the most important new trend for men. The old "s.e.x first" definition of men's affairs is changing. In this new crisis of infidelity, more men are now following what has traditionally been a female pattern, that of emotional bonding first and s.e.x later.

For her part, Lara was having an easier time of it at home. She had started being unhappy in her marriage just a few months after the honeymoon, yet had been married for two years. When she started thinking seriously of leaving Lenny, she tried to persuade him to go to counseling with her. He refused to go, so she went by herself for individual therapy. She felt that her marriage had been a mistake, that she had married the wrong person. She was outgoing and sociable, and Lenny was a workaholic. Watching TV was all he wanted to do when he wasn't working. He hardly ever seemed interested in hearing how her day went. Lara told him how unhappy she was and how lonely she felt. In frustration, she nagged and complained.

Then, gradually, because Ralph satisfied her longing for companionship and understanding, she stopped pursuing Lenny. She stopped asking him for attention. Lenny, convinced that her silence meant she was happier, felt secure in the (mistaken) belief that things were better. In reality, she had given up on the marriage and was putting her energy into her closeness with Ralph. Like Lenny, many husbands unfortunately don't realize the meaning of their wife's withdrawal until she withholds s.e.x-or, even worse, packs her bags.

Beginning a Double Life A useful measure for whether a relationship is a friendship or an affair is the degree of secrecy that surrounds it. Although Ralph was expansive in the beginning about his budding friendship with Lara, he got quieter about it with every pa.s.sing week. There was a lot he wasn't saying. If their relationship had been strictly platonic, he wouldn't have hesitated to share his encounters openly with Rachel. When it came to their private lunches and special times alone, he became the master of the white lie.

Let's see what the placement of walls and windows can show us that Ralph was either unable or unwilling to admit.

Where are the walls? Ralph stopped sharing the most vital, most interesting, and most gratifying part of his day. He wasn't talking to Rachel about Lara or about the subjects they found so fascinating. This secrecy created a distance between husband and wife. How could it be otherwise? Whenever people carry momentous secrets, they feel different, cut off, and isolated. One woman I know expressed perfectly the kind of communication we should all be striving for in our marriage: "How could I ever have an affair?" she asked. "I would immediately want to tell my husband about it. He is my best friend. I can't keep news like this a secret from my best friend."

Where are the windows? A window of intimacy was opening wide between Ralph and Lara. Although they had not kissed, they had begun confiding their s.e.xual attraction for each other.

Forty percent of the adulterous relationships in a British survey were "affairs of the heart." percent of the adulterous relationships in a British survey were "affairs of the heart."5

In effect, Ralph's emotional attachment to Lara and the secrecy that this engendered was a breach of trust between him and Rachel. The implicit and explicit understanding of their marriage rested on emotional as well as physical exclusivity. They had never agreed that full access to other people would be part of their commitment to each other.

Three Red Flags at the Threshold Ralph and Lara had stepped over the three thresholds that separate platonic friendships from romantic emotional affairs: 1. Emotional intimacy is the most powerful bond of all. Ralph and Lara shared more personal things about their hopes and fears than they were telling their spouses. They turned to each other to discuss troubling aspects of their marriages instead of working on the issues at home. They thought of themselves as soul mates and best friends. Compared with this, their spouses lived in the shadows like half-remembered dreams.

2. Secrecy waxes the slippery slope. Their budding romance was bound to thrive in the hothouse environment of the privacy they had built around their friendship. Ralph and Lara created a world well away from the pressure, responsibilities, and routines of ordinary family life. Ralph completely stopped mentioning Lara at home. The secret nature of their relationship automatically increased their intensity and fueled their preoccupation with each other.

3. s.e.xual chemistry is inflamed by forbidden s.e.x. Ralph and Lara began telling each other how much they turned each other on. Both of them fantasized about what their s.e.xual relationship would be like, even though they agreed that they would never act on their mutual desire. But in suppressing it, they found the s.e.xual tension being deliciously increased.

Commitment versus Permission When a friendship turns into a s.e.xual relationship, people who are married or in an exclusive relationship have already ignored their original commitment and given themselves permission to go ahead. For some people, commitment comes with a mindfulness of the need for exclusivity, about which they have no second thoughts. They seem to have a red stoplight built into their senses. For others, commitment is conditional and seems to come with a yellow warning light that can be heeded or ignored. They split hairs and decide that their commitment permits them to do this but does not allow them to do that. Their conditional commitment may also be dependent on the state of their marriage. Still others have turned a forbidden transgression into a reasonable option and have given themselves a green light to go full speed ahead.

Red Light: For many people commitment means: "I commit myself to an exclusive physical and emotional relationship with you until one of us dies. No matter what attractive alternative comes into my life, I will not be deterred from my goal of keeping you as my one and only life partner." This is the ideal. It is the default position and a.s.sumption in our culture. This is what most people a.s.sume they are getting and giving when they marry, although very few couples actually discuss it explicitly before they formalize their attachment.

But even if they do talk about it and really mean it with all their hearts in the beginning, when the romantic stage of a relationship pa.s.ses, one or the other may not feel like it anymore. The novelty wears off, the years go by, youth and beauty fade, and quirks that were once endearing become annoying. At this point, a lot of people slip into a more conditional commitment.

Yellow Light: "'Til death do us part" becomes a commitment to stay, but not necessarily a commitment not to stray. As we have seen, the definition of what const.i.tutes an affair tends to change according to who is doing the defining. I have heard both husbands and wives insist to their spouse that they have honored their commitment either because they never really loved the affair partner or they never actually had extramarital s.e.xual intercourse.

A distraught wife said to her husband, "How could you do this to me? You always looked down on those men who had affairs and broke up their family." The husband displayed his alternative interpretation of commitment by replying, "I was always committed to you. I never once intended to leave you." She was enraged. "What do you mean, you were committed? How could you be committed when you had s.e.x with another woman?" He answered, "It never meant anything. Why are you making such a big deal out of it?"

Green Light: Ralph was convinced his relationship with Lara was unique, that he wasn't like those other men who have affairs just to prove something. He told himself that their communion with each other provided the perfect setting for profound self-discovery and human insight. He believed he would learn more about himself and about life by pursuing this opportunity to its fullest. He thought about all those admonitions from popular philosophers to take risks, follow your bliss, and live fully in the moment. He made mental lists of people he knew who had died of boredom in stultifying jobs and marriages. Although he was not sure whether or not he loved Lara, he was curious about what s.e.x with her would feel like. He missed s.e.xual excitement as part of his married life. He was confident that he could control the risk to his marriage by engineering his relationship with Lara so that no one would ever know.

In my clinical sample, two-thirds of the husbands and wives who had extramarital intercourse regarded falling in love as a justification for having an extramarital relationship.

For Lara, the reasons to go ahead were simpler. She was unhappy with her husband and happy with Ralph. She told herself that her marriage had been a mistake and that she was in love with Ralph. He was her soul mate. She wanted to feel alive the way one does at the beginning of a great love affair. When she thought back over her life, she thought she had played it too safe. She was haunted by the sense that if she had been braver, she would have gone after what she wanted and been happier. She didn't want to make that mistake again. Lara knew that there might be obstacles to overcome, but she had no doubt it was worth it. She was able to rationalize her relationship with Ralph because she was in love with him. Like many other unfaithful individuals, she believed that falling in love was the only acceptable justification for having an affair.

Although Ralph and Lara used different personal rationalizations, they were both influenced by how many married people they knew who had had affairs. There is no doubt that we are all affected by what we see others doing. They knew of at least one other work affair in their department, and both of them had friends who were involved, without any apparent penalty. When Ralph and Lara finally did give themselves permission to be physically intimate, the opportunity and the timing were right for them, and their att.i.tudes and experiences had prepared them to justify their decision.

Step 4: The s.e.xually Intimate Affair/ The Threatened Marriage An affair that is characterized by full emotional sharing and s.e.xual intercourse is very powerful. It is like a snare that has been woven by intertwining strands of affection, shared experiences, and s.e.xual pleasure. It's not hard to see why such combined-type affairs are the most disruptive to the marriage and the hardest to get over.

What's Happening in the Affair?

It is a bigger leap to that first kiss than it is from kissing to s.e.xual intercourse. After five months of emotional but not physical intimacy, Ralph and Lara's feelings finally spilled over into their first kiss. They were driving together to meet a client for a midafternoon meeting. It was unusual for them to be in the car alone together, as they usually made client calls with other members of their team. On this particular Friday, however, their boss asked them to go together. At the end of the drive Ralph told Lara she was beautiful. She turned toward him, and when he pulled into the parking lot, he reached over and kissed her. It surprised them both, but that first taste was like a drug. They had a hard time regaining their professional demeanor and making the meeting.

Over that weekend, Ralph was a model husband and father. He got up early on Sat.u.r.day morning, swept the garage, and put out the recycling. In the afternoon, he took his son to soccer practice and suggested that the whole family go out to dinner at their favorite place on Sat.u.r.day night. Later that night, he made love to Rachel with real attention. On Sunday, he offered to do the grocery shopping and sat with the children during the umpteenth viewing of their favorite movie. There was a bounce to his step. Everything was effortless. Nothing bothered him and nothing tired him.

He tried to think seriously about the implications of his kissing Lara. He had never done anything like this before. He knew it was a violation of his values. His brief attempts to think rationally about what he was doing fizzled into nothing. He kept skipping over the troublesome details and reliving the glorious scene over and over in his mind. He was afraid it might lead to s.e.x, and, at the same time, he was hoping it would.

That first kiss turned Ralph and Lara into teenagers again. There was now no question in their own minds that they were deeply involved. They started taking small risks: touching each other when they were alone in the coffee room, choosing restaurants where they could eat lunch unnoticed in darkened booths, whispering their s.e.xual thoughts to each other as they pa.s.sed in the hallway. They spent time making out in Ralph's car, inhibiting the desire to go further. They even sent a couple of thinly veiled e-mails through the office intranet. They told each other their fantasies of what it would be like to indulge their desires to the fullest.

In my clinical sample, 44 percent of husbands and 57 percent of wives reported strong emotional involvement in their affair without s.e.xual intercourse.

Then one day, Lara invited Ralph to lunch at her house on a Friday when her husband was out of town. He knew this was a big step. He was excited, scared, and curious all at the same time. As soon as he stepped inside her house, he held her close and kissed her. She led him to the sofa, where they fondled each other with a sense of freedom and privacy they hadn't known before. They had barely enough time to wolf down the chicken salad Lara had made before they had to get back to work.

The second time Lara invited Ralph to lunch at her house, they picked up lunch at a deli on the way and ate in the car. When they were finally alone in Lara's living room, they stood, touching each other tenderly for a long time. Then Lara told him she'd like him to come upstairs. When Ralph realized she was leading him up to her bedroom, he felt his stomach lurch. He realized that he didn't want to make love on the bed that was hers and Lenny's. Lara understood and suggested they use the twin bed in the guest room instead. As Ralph moved toward the bed, he was aware that everything felt strange. He felt displaced somehow. Mixed in with his excitement was uncertainty about what was going to happen.

Lara pushed him gently down on the bed and stood before him, undressing slowly. He had never seen her without all her clothes on and couldn't help comparing her with Rachel, who was not as firm or as young, but who was still in good shape after having two children.

Evolutionary psychologists a.s.sert that women are looking for power and resources in a mate, and men are searching for youth and beauty.6

As Lara started to undress him, he felt overwhelmed by the gravity of what they were doing. He almost stopped her. But his hesitation didn't last long, and soon, all he knew was desire for the beautiful woman who was holding him. They began to make love, and, although it was hard to stop the momentum, Ralph found himself saying that he didn't want to go all the way. Lara was surprised, but she accepted his wishes, and they moved easily on to satisfying each other through oral s.e.x instead. They realized afterward that their feelings of intimacy could hardly have been more complete.

Only when they were finished, lying entwined together, did Lara realize that she was a little disappointed that they hadn't had intercourse. But her regret was fleeting as she relished the excitement and happiness she still felt. Ralph's resistance to making love in her marriage bed made her think that maybe her suggestion that they do it that way was symbolic. Maybe she was ready for Ralph to replace Lenny, whom she increasingly found immature and unsophisticated by comparison.

As Ralph lay in bed with Lara, he was happy, but also uneasy. There was some stirring of nausea, some slight queasiness. He detected inside himself a small voice of anxiety and accusation. What had he done? Would he get away with it? Where, would it end? But this voice began to quiet as the hours pa.s.sed. Two days later, it was completely gone. He could hardly wait to be with her again.

Many men define s.e.xual infidelity as intercourse. For them, other physical intimacies "don't count." This att.i.tude allowed President Clinton to a.s.sert angrily, "I did not have s.e.xual relations with that woman." By their own reckoning, Ralph and Lara had been "together" for eleven months and Ralph felt more comfortable not having intercourse with Lara. Stopping short of this final pleasure allowed him to maintain a sense of integrity that preserved his sense of himself as a moral person.

For women, crossing the threshold into infidelity occurs when there is any kind of s.e.xual intimacy, such as romantic kissing. For men, the significant threshold is s.e.xual intercourse.7

Things escalated again three months later when Ralph and Lara had their first opportunity to go to an out-of-town conference with two other people from work. After a day at ending meetings and renewing professional contacts, they joined their a.s.sociates for dinner and drinks on Sat.u.r.day night. At about ten o'clock, everyone else went up to their rooms; Ralph and Lara decided to extend the evening with a nightcap in Lara's room. Although they hadn't discussed it ahead of time, they spent the whole night in each other's arms and had intercourse several times. For the first time, they told each other, "I love you." However, they cautiously stayed away from discussions about the future.

The next morning, before Ralph hurried to get back to his room, they talked about how natural it had all seemed. They began to believe they were destined for each other. They didn't think of their illicit relationship as a commonplace affair, but as a unique love story. They were able to escape their routine lives for a night and express themselves as free and pa.s.sionate characters in a bold drama.

There were several business trips after that, and those were the best times. They discovered that holding each other all night was just as wonderful as s.e.x.

What's Happening in the Marriage?

Ralph was making love to two women, both of whom he loved, although he loved them in different ways. During the period when Ralph was s.e.xually intimate with Lara but not having intercourse, he was exceptionally turned on at home with Rachel. She was surprised at his sudden interest, taking chances on the living room sofa while their young daughter napped in the next room, kissing her as she stepped out of the shower, coming up behind her as she loaded the dishwasher. He hadn't been this ardent for a long time. Rachel was amused and pleased and took to teasing him in a flirtatious way. He made her feel as if she had inadvertently acquired some magic power to entice him.

But after Ralph and Lara's first out-of-town encounter, Ralph's interest in s.e.x at home began to slow down. Rachel marveled that whatever had ignited his pa.s.sion a few months earlier had faded. They fell into a kind of rut, the kind of routinized s.e.x that Ralph had once derisively referred to as "missionary s.e.x." He wasn't as spontaneous as he used to be, and when she initiated, he was just as likely to pa.s.s up the opportunity as he was to take her up on it.

Rachel noticed some other little changes in Ralph, but nothing that concerned her. She thought of their relationship as ebbing and flowing, as it must in long-term marriages. She was disappointed that he hadn't taken the initiative to plan "romantic" time for the two of them as he used to, although he was willing to spend the weekend at a bed and breakfast when she arranged it. He didn't ch.o.r.eograph a loving birthday for her, although he did buy her an expensive present.

The only big change she was aware of was that he seemed more volatile emotionally. Sometimes he was warm and considerate, and sometimes he was short-tempered and irritable. A couple of times, it almost seemed as though he created arguments to justify being angry at her. He would erupt over something that seemed minor to her and rage out of the house, slamming the door. She would sit bewildered and in tears. She discovered that if she waited a few hours, he would come back, contrite and anxious to make it up to her. She didn't know that he was contacting Lara during his time away from the house. When Rachel tried to talk to him about what was going on, he seemed an anxious to avoid anything too intense or intimate. She got the feeling that he was absent in some way. She concluded that whatever was bothering him had nothing to do with her and was nothing he was ready to share with her.

Rachel did wonder, briefly, whether Ralph was involved with someone else. She thought about it and concluded that he couldn't and wouldn't. The only possible candidate was his friend Lara, whom Ralph rarely discussed, and when he did, he sounded matter-of-fact. It's true that there was that one time a month ago when Lara had called the house early on a Sunday morning. That was strange. She had said she was sorry but she needed to talk to Ralph about a project that was due on Monday. He hadn't seemed glad to hear from her, and Rachel didn't understand why she had had to call on a Sunday morning. A little pinp.r.i.c.k of suspicion had gone through her then, but nothing more came of it, so she had let it go.

The crumbling wall around Ralph and Rachel was made up of the obligations they had to each other as husband and wife and as parents to their children. Ralph still discussed things with Rachel that he didn't share with Lara. For example, they discussed summer vacation plans, whether to send their children to private school, their financial investments, and personal things (such as her premenstrual cramps). It was as though Rachel had become his platonic friend as Lara had become his lover. If asked, he would say that he loved his wife although he was not "in love" with her. When he compared Rachel and Lara, he had to admit that being with Rachel no longer gave him the emotional and physical high he felt with Lara.

When I hear people say that they are no longer in love with their spouse, I suspect they are unfairly comparing a long-term relationship with the excitement, singular focus, and idealization of a Stage I relationship. The first stage of romantic love is always exciting. Marriages pa.s.s through Stage I, however, into a reality-based love; sharing a past, working toward common goals, and accepting one another's flaws. This middle stage is hard. Affairs seldom maintain the rose-colored aura when they move out of the dark shadows into the light of daily life.

There was no question that Ralph maintained a security wall around his family life. He felt protective of his children and worked hard to provide for their physical and emotional well-being. Once when Lara made a critical comment about Rachel's mothering, Ralph bristled: She had no right to pa.s.s judgment on his wife, whom he considered to be a wonderful mother. He cared about Rachel and wanted her to be happy. Sometimes he thought about what it would be like if she, too, had a lover. He couldn't bear the possibility of losing her to another man, but felt his situation was different, of course, because he could handle it all.

The wall he had with Lara was higher and thicker than the family wall. In a sense, he felt less responsible for Lara but more defensive. He knew her every wound, her tender feelings, the n.o.bleness of her character. He wanted to shield her from the brutish disregard of her husband and the jostling of her job. He wanted to lock her away, and himself with her, sheltered from endless obligations and prying eyes.

The window between Ralph and Rachel was cloudy but not closed-sometimes open, and sometimes no more than a sliver. He often found himself pulling down the shade between him and Rachel. It wasn't that he no longer loved her, but being with her made him feel guilty. Although he communicated about mundane events, he was withholding the essence of his life from her. It was painful for him when Rachel continued to share confidences with him as though nothing had changed. He wondered whether she noticed that he wasn't reciprocating.

In contrast, the window was wide open between Ralph and Lara. The only information that didn't pa.s.s through was trivia they considered too inconsequential to bother with, or any concern that their idyllic interludes were built on a foundation of deception. They saw each other in the best possible light.

Lara confided in Ralph about Lenny. Ralph knew more about her worries regarding her marriage than Lenny did. Lara felt she had tried to talk to her husband, but he wouldn't listen. In contrast, Ralph didn't discuss Rachel with Lara, because he wanted to keep his worlds separate and he felt a sense of loyalty to Rachel. He knew that Rachel was open to discussing problems in their marriage and that he was the one who didn't want to talk about them.

When s.e.x Enters an Emotional Affair Relationships in which s.e.x occurs at the very beginning are less likely to have the deep level of emotional intimacy that occurs when s.e.x is delayed. That's why friendships that build on an emotional level before becoming s.e.xualized are more apt to be experienced as a deep emotional attachment.

In my clinical sample, 83 percent of women and 58 percent of men who had extramarital s.e.xual intercourse said that they had a strong or extremely deep emotional attachment to the affair partner.