How do you deal with friends having affairs?

[Anonymous]

If you don't have absolute definitive proof (not hearsay) and even if you do and it's not directed at you just keep quiet. It's tough to hear that as a spouse and they'll probably ignore you and create a rift anyways in the group. Also you don't know what's going on in their own lives.

HOWEVER if they try anything with you I would let their partner know that you're not comfortable with their advances and then mention. If not, just keep quiet and mind your own business.

[Anonymous]

Situations like this are why I really don't need to know other people other than my spouse and adult kids all that well. I'm polite, but distant. I don't need, or want, to know about you. I don't want to know your private dealings. I don't want to lose respect for you, which I would, deeply. Ignorance is bliss in some ways. Other people bring too many problems.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you don't have absolute definitive proof (not hearsay) and even if you do and it's not directed at you just keep quiet. It's tough to hear that as a spouse and they'll probably ignore you and create a rift anyways in the group. Also you don't know what's going on in their own lives.

HOWEVER if they try anything with you I would let their partner know that you're not comfortable with their advances and then mention. If not, just keep quiet and mind your own business.

All the proof talk and you don know what is going on in their lives is total cheater bs. There is rarely enough proof for a cheater to be honest and when people behave questionably that should be enough for a friend to say something. An outsider doesn’t know what is going on in their relationship, but the insiders should both have a shared understanding of their life.

Reality matters to people (excluding cheaters), so an actual friend would at least say what they have heard and give their friend the chance to figure it out. It could just be innocent flirting, but in my experience innocent flirting is rarely the subject for the rumor mill. Smoke meet fire.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Join in?

Lazy troll posts like this are the worst. With friends like you, who needs enemies?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I probably am friends with someone who’s had an affair and just don’t know it. I’m not judging others, marriage is long and incredibly complicated as are most people. That being said, I’m not going to be the one to vent to about affair dynamics. I wish happiness for my friends and ideally I’d like them to have it in a healthy way but at this point in my life (50s) that is a very uncommon occurrence. Most people struggle with a lot of stuff in long marriages.

What a refreshing voice of reason!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wouldn't care. It's not like they are sleeping with your spouse, correct?

Would you trust leaving your spouse with them?? Some women just give you the gut instinct…they aren’t part of the sisterhood. I had a roommate in a group house that banged her best friend’s BF. I walked in on it in the main room. She did this kind of stuff often. She wouldn’t guess it about her. She appeared nice and put together. She was chubby/fat so I think it stemmed from insecurity and poor self-esteem which is true of most APs/OW I’ve known about.

+100 I had a “friend” like this. She openly would flirt with my husband. She once grabbed his nuts in front of a patio full of people when drunk. We cut her off- went no contact. Later other friends said they always thought she had a thing for my spouse. She ended up alienating a lot of people with her web of lies…oh and a decade later her husband divorced her for…..cheating. She had a perfectly curated life/image for about a decade—the walls caved in on her eventually.

But...that person wasn't a friend. This is what I don't understand - you stopped being friends with this person because of her behavior, NOT because you knew she was cheating. She happened to ALSO be a cheater, but that's not why you cut her off.

It's almost like some of you think a cheater is exactly and always like the PP described, but they're not. I know some people who have cheated that shocked me and they have never done anything like that in any other area of their life. That's not everyone, of course, but I think this blanket "I would cut off of a friend if they cheated" is a really myopic view to take.

[Anonymous]

OP doesn’t have proof. She sounds unstable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wouldn't care. It's not like they are sleeping with your spouse, correct?

Would you trust leaving your spouse with them?? Some women just give you the gut instinct…they aren’t part of the sisterhood. I had a roommate in a group house that banged her best friend’s BF. I walked in on it in the main room. She did this kind of stuff often. She wouldn’t guess it about her. She appeared nice and put together. She was chubby/fat so I think it stemmed from insecurity and poor self-esteem which is true of most APs/OW I’ve known about.

+100 I had a “friend” like this. She openly would flirt with my husband. She once grabbed his nuts in front of a patio full of people when drunk. We cut her off- went no contact. Later other friends said they always thought she had a thing for my spouse. She ended up alienating a lot of people with her web of lies…oh and a decade later her husband divorced her for…..cheating. She had a perfectly curated life/image for about a decade—the walls caved in on her eventually.

But...that person wasn't a friend. This is what I don't understand - you stopped being friends with this person because of her behavior, NOT because you knew she was cheating. She happened to ALSO be a cheater, but that's not why you cut her off.

It's almost like some of you think a cheater is exactly and always like the PP described, but they're not. I know some people who have cheated that shocked me and they have never done anything like that in any other area of their life. That's not everyone, of course, but I think this blanket "I would cut off of a friend if they cheated" is a really myopic view to take.

This isn't unusual. I've been with women who go on guard around their "slutty" roommate or their BFF who flirts with everyone the woman appears to want. And yet they remain roommates/friends.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Situations like this are why I really don't need to know other people other than my spouse and adult kids all that well. I'm polite, but distant. I don't need, or want, to know about you. I don't want to know your private dealings. I don't want to lose respect for you, which I would, deeply. Ignorance is bliss in some ways. Other people bring too many problems.

+1

[Anonymous]

If a friend reveals their affair to you, it’s a cry for help. Most people are not gonna pull their close friends into the web of their affair. So if he or she is bringing it up, they are probably looking for some advice on how to execute themselves (even subconsciously).

When you get to that point, then you can lay out your advice and figure out how to handle the friendship moving forward.

Frankly, I think it’s way more common for people to not reveal their affairs to even their best friends. And that makes sense – people do not want to get caught.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If a friend reveals their affair to you, it’s a cry for help. Most people are not gonna pull their close friends into the web of their affair. So if he or she is bringing it up, they are probably looking for some advice on how to execute themselves (even subconsciously).

When you get to that point, then you can lay out your advice and figure out how to handle the friendship moving forward.

Frankly, I think it’s way more common for people to not reveal their affairs to even their best friends. And that makes sense – people do not want to get caught.

Sometimes they need an alibi.