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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]You guys don't get it. It's not just the cheating. It's the lying, sneaking around. It's other people finding out before you do and talking about it behind your back while you walk around totally unaware and people say "wow she's so clueless" behind your back.

I can imagine a cheating scenario where it really is "just" cheating. A very discrete fling or a one night stand or even a series of one night stands, where no one else knows and you work through it as a couple and it hurts but doesn't upend your whole world.

But people on this thread aren't talking about that kind of infidelity. They are talking about betrayal. Like your DH had a three year affair with his ex-girlfriend who is now pregnant. That kind of betrayal. The kind you don't move on from quickly. The kind that results in you waking up like a year later and remembering a dinner party you went to and realizing that your host knew about the affair and the pregnancy and was so nice to you but also said nothing and you just sat their oblivious, looking like a total idiot.

The actual act of cheating is really just the half of it.[/quote]

So it's better if he has a two year affair but you know about it the whole time?[/quote]

Yes 100% this would be better because if you know you can make choices. I'm not saying that would be great or I'd like it, but for these commenters saying that OP or PPs are being overly dramatic when they say they still haven't recovered many years later, what they are missing is that the lying and sneaking around is central to the betrayal, not incidental.

This is also why emotional affairs can be so damaging. The act of actually having s*x with another person when you've promised not to is hurtful, but for many people the part that hurts the most is the emotional betrayal and the lying, being made an outsider or even an interloper in your own marriage.

I think the emotional response to this might be biological coded and trigger the fear that humans once felt about being on the outside of a tribe. Humans are pack animals and we form families and communities in large part because we are weak, vulnerability animals whose needs are best met in a group. A spouse is often your most concrete, reliable community tie. If that person lies to you as they form a bond with someone else, I think it triggers a hormonal fear response, like you've been pushed to the fringes of the tribe and are now more vulnerable to predatory animals.[/quote]

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