Emotional infidelity – fact or fiction?

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Your husband’s friend Angela has just phoned again. For the third time this week. And while you’re slaving away in the kitchen, you hear them laughing on the telephone and your hackles rise. Are you being unreasonable and petty, as you know they are only friends and nothing more?

“Not necessarily,” says Cape Town psychologist, Ilse Terblanche. “When much of the social attention that is usually present in a marriage is diverted elsewhere, it is perfectly normal to feel betrayed in some way. Infidelity is not necessarily only sexual – it can be emotional too. And yes, this can make a marriage suffer.”

“People’s insecurities are brought to the fore by a situation where someone else is receiving an enormous amount of their spouse’s attention. But there is a big difference between being a bit jealous and jealously obsessing about your partner. If your partner goes out once in a blue moon for an hour to have a drink with an old school friend, you are overreacting if you go into jealousy overdrive. But if it’s the fourth time this week, you have every reason to be unhappy.”

“A strong emotional connection between your spouse and a friend/colleague, with whom lots of emotional intimacies are shared, will eventually drive a wedge between spouses, whether there is a sexual relationship between them or not. And very strong emotional attachments elsewhere could be very dangerous for your relationship or marriage. But both partners should also be allowed to see friends, obviously within reasonable limits. If you don’t allow your partner any outside contact, you have already signed the death warrant for your marriage. No-one likes being made to feel that they are in a prison.”

“Similar feelings of betrayal can be brought on by emotional infidelity than by sexual infidelity. The spouse who sits at home wonders whether the other man or woman is more compatible with their partner than they are, why they were not invited along and why their spouse no longer makes them feel special.”

“However, it must be guarded against that all friendships are suddenly seen as emotional infidelity,” says Terblanche. “Married people do need friends, sometimes of both sexes, as no one person can fulfill all your social needs. The question just remains where you draw the line and whether your first priority is still with your partner.”

So when does the line get crossed between normal friendship and emotional infidelity?

Time factor. When you realise that your spouse spends more time with this friend than with you, there is a problem. If the friend is only here for three days from Europe, obviously that’s different. Your spouse’s first responsibility lies with you and your relationship, not with an outsider. We all need time out from our partners every now and then to watch sport, to go shopping, to go fishing, or whatever. But the majority of free time should still be spent with you.

Spouse not invited. If things get planned to which you are specifically not invited, there could be a problem. If you suspect that work-related activities could be merely a guise, investigate. But remember that there are things such as genuine work-related things, so don’t get too suspicious. It’s not good for your blood pressure. But if your spouse and his/her friend start doing things like going to the movies or eating out on a regular basis and you get the feeling that your presence will not be welcome and you are made to feel like an outsider, you have every reason to complain. One or the other of them could have ulterior motives.

Too much involvement elsewhere. There is a big difference between helping a friend who’s just had a burglary or helping a brother buy curtains for a new flat and spending weeks helping a friend who’s looking for a house to buy. Or getting overly involved in helping them buy a car. Or lending them lots of money – possibly without telling you. Or if your spouse is spending time fixing things at the friend’s house when there are millions of things waiting to be done at home. Your spouse’s main focus should be at home with you and the children – for most of the time anyway.

Didn’t I tell you? When you feel that you are no longer the main confidant of your spouse, alarm bells should start ringing. When your spouse’s friend knows about a promotion or an illness or a winning lottery ticket before you do, there’s a problem. Or if little everyday things are no longer shared with you, because they have already been shared with the friend, you are being systematically excluded. Or if you get the feeling that your spouse is discussing your relationship with this friend, you have every reason to complain.

Duty vs. pleasure. When paying the bills, going to the supermarket and the PTA evenings are the only things you do with your spouse, you should be getting worried. Especially if all the fun things are being done with one or more other people and you just are around when the boring stuff happens. Relationships should consist of a mixture between duty and pleasure. And what’s more, if your partner starts associating you only with boring duties, the writing could be on the wall.

Always part of the equation. Your spouse somehow feels responsibility for the well-being of this person – to the point where you feel that no plans of yours are made without considering this friend and his or her needs and wants. You feel you have to explain why he or she cannot accompany you on some family outing or holiday, whereas no explanation is really needed.

Friend takes priority. You get the feeling if both you and the friend were to have a crisis at the same time, your spouse might just go to the friend first. You are beginning to feel like you’re being taken for granted and that you and your needs and your relationship are becoming of secondary importance.

The friend is pitted against you. When you feel the friend is starting the one-upmanship game, such as lording it over you when he/she knows something before you, red lights should be flashing. This friend is competing for your spouse and his/her attention and is certainly no friend to you. On the contrary. It is also quite possible that your spouse is enjoying having two people fight over his/her attention and is pitting the two of you against each other. If this friend were really a friend to both of you, you would often be included in invitations and gatherings. And the two of you would do things on your own sometimes as well.

What should you do?
This is a difficult one as you don’t want to provoke the kind of situation where a huge fight takes place and your spouse goes to find solace elsewhere. It is important to share your feelings calmly in a non-accusatory manner. An example of this would be, “When you go out for the third time in a week with Gary and leave me here, I feel rejected and unwanted.” Tell your spouse how you feel, but try not to explode or shout and scream. You will only look jealous, possessive and unattractive. And this will make the company of the friend look all the more attractive. If your spouse’s friend indeed does have ulterior motives, your are playing right into their hands by fighting with your partner. Ask to be included in some future activities – this is not unreasonable.

(Susan Erasmus, Health24)

Is infidelity only about sex?

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Joy Crawford
The Jamaica Observer

Monday, June 27, 2005

Is infidelity only about sex? Is it different between the sexes? Are men unfaithful for different reasons than women are?

Men and women view infidelity differently. For women, infidelity is usually a life-long thing. They take it personally and, often, their relationship is irrevocably harmed by the knowledge that their man has been unfaithful. Men, on the other hand, view so-called infidelity as no big thing. As my good friend Dr Aggrey Irons explained many years ago, men perceive it as fidelity versus loyalty.

A man can be unfaithful by sleeping with fifty or even a hundred other woman but the problem arises when he is disloyal, meaning he is ready to make a commitment to another woman. In fact, to take this theory to its natural conclusion, a woman is in a better position if a man has several dalliances with faceless women than if he has one steady other woman with whom he spends all his time and lavishes her with trinkets.

When I was younger, I used to literally die at the thought that my man could ever, ever want to stray, much less do so. Eventually I realised that what men do with their bodies is recreational. I cannot say that I like it, but I have learnt to understand it. However, I certainly don’t want to know about it. It is not so much a fool’s paradise as much as acceptance of the things that one cannot change. As a result, I have embraced the Serenity Prayer:

“God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,

Courage to change the things I can,

And the wisdom to know the difference.

Living one day at a time,

Enjoying one moment at a time,

Accepting hardship as the pathway to peace.”
It seems that, since time immemorial, women have had to endure infidelity. Our Victorian predecessors openly embraced their husbands having bed wenches because it gave them a break from the rigours of sex. Our eastern counterparts are resigned to be one of many wives. They have accepted what is.

But why do people stray? Men do it maybe because it is expected of them. Some view monogamy as an unnatural phenomenon and feel very little remorse about sampling other fare. They want variety. They want to constantly feel desired and desirable, even if they have paunches and receding hairlines.

Men are having it good now. In fact, Levitra, Cialis and Viagra are doing booming business. Men have acquired a new lease on life. For them, there is indeed life after impotence.

So men will see a nubile, young thing and simply rise to the occasion. They are not, at that time, thinking about how much they love their wife or woman. In fact, if one were to take the time to ask them, one would find that they do love their wives.
Love has absolutely nothing to do with it. It is merely raging hormones and male pride, misplaced as that might be.
A man is able to love his wife and still find the time and energy to service another woman. It is simply business, no tugging at the heart-strings. For a man, infidelity is usually only about sex, hence Aggrey’s theory about fidelity and loyalty. (I am, however, not for one moment, saying that some men don’t stray when their relationship has problems, like the wife not wanting to have sex.)

As women, we may not like it but we have to learn to try and cope with it, since we can’t accept it. And I do not subscribe to the philosophy that two can play. This tit-for-tat business has never worked, but it all depends on what you, as a woman, are looking for.

Women, on the other hand, are unfaithful because they are usually hurt and looking for companionship. The average man who plays usually makes the mistake of not doing his homework. He neglects his wife.

He is usually so absorbed in his sexual callisthenics that he has nothing left for home. That causes a strain because his woman will, invariably, pick up on something and the closeness they once shared is severely compromised to the point that she will find comfort elsewhere, often by just confiding in one of the opposite sex, and, voila, an affair begins. The thing about it is that very few women can just have sex with a man. When the average woman has sex, the man is usually getting everything she has.

Far too many men lose women they never planned to lose to another man because they don’t get it. When a woman is unfaithful, her emotional being is usually engulfed with the other man. There are so many men who play the field and have friends keeping their wife company only to realise that those friends take over.

When will we ever learn? Perhaps never; but women need to take control of their emotional lives and try to understand their men better, for like it or not, they are all we have. We can’t live without them, or can we?

Joy Crawford is an attorney-at-law.

Red flags of infidelity

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Fri, June 24, 2005
By JOANNE RICHARD, TORONTO SUN

DOES HE LOOK at other cheating men disapprovingly?

Does he reassure you, “I’d never do that?”

Is he getting distant, critical, and secretive about money? How about giving you expensive gifts unexpectedly?

Well, he’s probably cheating.

Statistics show that a surprising proportion of men — 35% — cheat on their wives, and authors Elizabeth Landers and Vicky Mainzer, contend that every unfaithful husband exhibits the same signs along the way.

In fact, cheaters follow the exact same script — which is the name of their new book: The Script: The 100% Absolutely Predictable Thing Men Do When They Cheat (Hyperion, 2005).

“It’s the same words and actions every time … almost always in the same order,” says Mainzer, who along with Landers interviewed hundreds of women across the country, and heard the same lines over and over again.

Mandy D. of Etobicoke can attest to the predictability: Her husband of 11 years had an affair with a colleague during which he was guilty of many of the common red flags, including telling her that she was “useless, crazy and didn’t contribute enough. He told me I didn’t have enough ambition or drive. He became militant, derogatory and emotionally void,” says Mandy, who does not want her real name used.

Her husband was out late every night using his sales job as an excuse and constantly putting her down when it came to appearance, the children and the house. “I couldn’t do anything right.”

When she’d confront him, he’d tell her she had the problem and should see a psychiatrist.

It’s all in the cheating man’s script.

“They’re ridiculously predictable — scary common what men do when they’re cheating. I’ve talked to so many other women, and their husband all did the same things,” says Mandy, mother of three, who has stayed with her husband but they still struggle with the fallout of his infidelity.

“Every woman who experiences an unfaithful husband feels confused and baffled by his contradictory statements and behaviour. She starts to believe that she really must be crazy, unappealing, selfish, and unloving, just as her husband says,” says Mainzer, who’s been divorced for 15 years and lives in Idaho.

But it’s just all part of the Script, they say.

The Script is a wakeup call to women everywhere, says Mainzer — their month-old book spells out the red flags of infidelity in order that women can take action and turn the tide of disaster before it’s too late. They’re out to interrupt the script early on and revise the ending to a happy one.

The authors believe it’s important to recognize the pattern, fix what’s broken in the relationship and put an end to divorce everywhere. “You get cheated out of social status, financial status and your family gets cheated — it get ripped apart. And children undergo very difficult struggles.”

According to Dr. Bonnie Eaker Weil, the fall-out is enormous, like an emotional nervous breakdown that rocks a marriage to its very core — “it takes years to built the trust and for sexual healing to occur.”

Through her extensive work in infidelity, she believes 70% of men cheat — “one partner in 80% of marriages have an affair,” says Eaker Weil, author of Adultery, The Forgivable Sin (Hudson House) and most recently Can You Cure and Forgive Adultery (Infinity Press).

According to Eaker Weil, a New York therapist who specializes in working with couples who want to overcome the devastating effects of betrayal, “an affair is a cry for help. It’s an inability for one partner to get close so they seek to self-medicate with a quick fix — the adultery fills the emptiness momentarily but it doesn’t solve the problem and the fallout reverberates for generations to come.”

The most stressed out men are the most likely to have affairs — “it does calm them down momentarily and fills that emotional chemical emptiness but not for long.”

Meanwhile, adds Mainzer, interrupt the script along the way — if you see something, say something: “Treat the pain early. In other words, if you feel something is up, talk about it sooner rather than later because it will be easier to solve when it’s a small problem …”

But if the bomb is dropped and he says he’s leaving, then take command, advises The Script. “You’ve been shot by a stun gun. But don’t let it stun you into inaction. By taking command, you calm those around you and gather your forces … call a lawyer.”

—

TELLTALE SIGNS

Keep your eyes open for these behaviours, advises infidelity expert Dr. Bonnie Eaker Weil.

HE:

– Picks fights

– Acts unappreciated

– Becomes critical and finds fault

– Become distant and non-communicative

– Changes his image, i.e. loses weight, buys new clothes

– Telling you there’s something wrong with you and you should seek professional help

– Changes his money behaviour

– Changes in sexual behaviour, patterns, positions and frequency

– Buys gifts and does good deeds, such as chores around the house and helps more with the kids — “this assuages the guilt he’s feeling and it counteracts his bad behaviour away from home”

– Unexplained absenses

– Hang-ups on your home phone

– Starts leaving earlier for work and arriving home later

PI Kellerman serves justice, stakes out cheaters

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Thursday, June 16, 2005
The Madison St. Clair Record

By Ann Knef

If you’re a viewer of the TV show “Cheaters”– face it. You’re fascinated by clandestine glimpses into the seamy side of life Greg Kellerman, who operates the Glen Carbon-based Kellerman Investigations, is a private investigator who stakes out cheaters and describes his work as “the best job in the world.”

Even though the majority of his time is spent as a process server–three months ago he served papers to rapper Nelly at a concert in Carbondale–he also provides remedies for a variety of domestic, social and corporate ills.

For $500 he recently confirmed the suspicions of a betrayed Metro-East wife. Two blocks away through the eye of a long lens, her trimmed-down, earringed and tattooed husband who quit his job, was discovered having an affair in the back seat of a new sports car in St. Louis.

“I can help anyone who has a cheating spouse,” Kellerman said, “with same day results.”

Equipped with a buttonhole and pencil camera-undercover essentials-Kellerman also gets repeat business from employers keeping tabs on worker’s compensation cases. “For instance, an employee says he is hurt on the job, but there may be others in the company who do not believe it,” he said. “Then I see them on roofing jobs or doing other activities like boating.”

Last month Kellerman satisfied a business client with evidence that the low back problems of a worker confined to light duty, oddly wasn’t getting in the way of the employee’s love for small motor car racing. “I saw him lifting 450-pound cars,” Kellerman said. Kellerman takes pride in his company’s competitive process serving rates–$45 flat fee for service in Madison, St. Clair and contiguous counties-and nothing for non-service. “We have a quick T-A-T (turn around time),” he said, “and we have the best prices in town.”

Kellerman Investigation’s newest innovation came via a $10,000 website upgrade which introduced “e-service” for customers world-wide.

“A client can register online, pay online and upload their documents to be served online,” he said.

“I never even need speak to them,” he said.

A former fire fighter and correctional officer, Kellerman loves the dynamic nature of the work. “You get a phone call and it can completely change your day.” Kellerman, who is permitted by law to carry a firearm, also captures fugitives and provides close body protection.

He believes his work is important to the civil judicial process. “When it comes to serving papers, it has to be done right or the system falls to its knees,” he said.

Ann Knef

Are Women Naturally Monogamous? Asks ‘Women’s Infidelity’ Author Michelle Langley

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Press Release
Thursday June 16, 7:55 am ET

ST. LOUIS, June 16 /PRNewswire/ — With women initiating approximately 70- 75% of all divorces, “Women’s Infidelity” author Michelle Langley believes the answer is a resounding “no.” Langley contends women frequently pursue separations and divorces under the guise of “searching for self”; however, she states the real reason is often another man. Langley says it’s not uncommon for women to be happily married prior to having affairs. She also states that many men are being divorced by their wives without ever knowing about their wives’ extramarital relationships.

Langley believes as a society we need to stop perpetuating the myth that females are naturally monogamous because in today’s world, it is doing more harm than good. She asserts in the past, prior to DNA testing, the monogamous myth was helpful in easing paternity insecurity in males. However, today, this erroneous belief keeps women from taking responsibility when they do cheat. When women cheat they typically put the blame on their husband. Langley believes women’s lack of knowledge about their own natural sexual impulses makes them much more likely than men to leave their marriages due to their sexual attractions and affairs. Again, studies prove currently women are initiating approximately 70-75% of all divorces.

Researching women’s sexual behavior has been Michelle Langley’s focus for almost a decade. She began an independent inquiry into the subject after a series of unrelated incidents sparked her interest. Several years into her research she was able to identify distinctive patterns and behaviors in the women she interviewed. She categorized these patterns into “stages” that women often experience during the course of their long-term relationships. The stages begin with the loss of sexual desire. Her book, “Women’s Infidelity: Living in Limbo: What Women Really Mean When They Say, ‘I’m Not Happy,'” delves head-on into this controversial subject matter and is available for purchase at http://www.womensinfidelity.com.

For information: http://www.womensinfidelity.com

Contact:

Michelle Langley
314-352-6554
michelleclangley@aol.com
http://www.womensinfidelity.com

Extramarital affairs at the office leave employees fending for themselves

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By SUE SHELLENBARGER, The Wall Street Journal

For Dick Kline, office romance in the news this week hit a sore spot.
When a creative director he worked with on a previous job years ago had an extramarital affair with a co-worker, Mr. Kline, an art director, and other employees of the big ad agency were aware of it. The illicit relationship was not only a distraction in the office but offended some co-workers, causing them to lose respect for the creative director.
The experience left Mr. Kline, of Yonkers, N.Y., with some clear-cut views on morality at the office: “The rules of the game should be, ‘No hanky-panky during working hours. No exceptions.”‘

His experience lends insight into why some office romances erupt into scandal. Most employers look the other way when issues of morality arise around extramarital affairs; Boeing’s firing this week of CEO Harry Stonecipher, whose dalliance risked embarrassing the company, was an exception. But co-workers don’t look the other way. Colleagues rush in where corporate leaders fear to tread, fixing on their co-workers’ romantic wrongs, making judgments and often lashing out in damaging ways.
The events leading to Mr. Stonecipher’s departure were triggered when directors were tipped off to the relationship after receiving a copy of explicit e-mail he had written. It isn’t yet known who alerted the directors.

Co-workers are often affected by extramarital flings at the office. They may feel morally compromised if a colleague expects them to be complicit in hiding an extramarital affair from a spouse. They may lose out on promotions or projects if the boss favors a lover over them.

Although polls show a large majority of Americans believe extramarital affairs are wrong, employers typically resist making such judgments. Just 12 percent of 391 companies surveyed by the American Management Association have written guidelines on office dating.

One reason is that about 20 states and many cities ban employment discrimination on the basis of marital status. If a married employee who has an affair is fired and an unmarried employee who has an affair is not, the fired employee in those states conceivably could claim illegal discrimination, attorneys say. Thus, many employers turn a blind eye to marital cheating.

That creates an environment where employees are often on their own in deciding what to do about it. Some workers in the 1990s tried to advance so-called third-party sexual harassment lawsuits, claiming they had missed out on promotions or raises because a superior favored an office lover. But the courts have backed away; generally, judges have ruled co-workers’ injuries aren’t severe or pervasive enough to warrant damages, says Gregory M. Davis, an employment attorney in Chicago with Seyfarth Shaw.

Nevertheless, some outraged co-workers feel compelled to act, dropping the political equivalent of an A-bomb and potentially sending their own careers into a Linda Tripp-like swoon. Before taking that path, ask yourself first whether you’re experiencing measurable on-the-job damage, or just moral outrage. Try “straightening out your feelings with your own minister or therapist” rather than attacking the co-worker, advises Ann Pardo, director of behavioral health at Canyon Ranch Health Resort, Tucson, Ariz.
Janet Lever, a sociologist at California State University who has studied the matter, says people have a legitimate beef if a co-worker, in effect, expects them to lie on their behalf. In such cases, co-workers have a right to say, “Don’t make me do your dirty work,” she says.

If an affair disrupts your work or harms teamwork or morale, “the first step is to go to that offending person face-to-face, privately,” Dr. Pardo says. If that fails or isn’t feasible, consider talking to a human-resources manager. At that point, however, you lose control: Depending upon the rules or customs at your office, a human-resource manager might ignore you; counsel the offender(s); report the affair to a supervisor; or arrange for one or both of the offending lovers to be transferred or fired.

More employees will likely face these issues in the future. While the proportion of men admitting to ever having had an extramarital affair is about flat at 22 percent, the same as a decade ago, evidence suggests that the number of women who have cheated is rising. The National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago says 15 percent of the women in a 3,000 person survey said “yes” when asked if they had ever engaged in an extramarital affair, up from 10 percent previously, based on a 2002 survey. More of these affairs are taking place in the workplace.

A few employers have taken steps toward a solution. Southwest Airlines, which employs more than 1,000 married couples, explicitly allows consensual office relationships. But it also has set a process for employees who object to a particular office romance to complain to the employee-relations department or to a manager, who in turn is charged with finding a remedy if the affair “negatively impacts our culture,” the company says.
More employers should probably do the same.

Adultery

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Most of us believe adultery is wrong, but that doesn’t stop it from happening

GANNETT NEWS SERVICE

Adultery used to be scandalous. Infidelity nearly ruined the career of Frank Sinatra after he left his wife for Ava Gardner. It didn’t endear Eddie Fisher and Liz Taylor to the public, either.

Now, adultery is hard to avoid in film, television or the real-life celebrity betrayal du jour in newspapers and magazines. The Internet is clogged with spouses cruising for discreet trysts. Many portals and dating services even specialize in facilitating such liaisons.

“I grew up in a neighborhood where there was a case of husband A running off with wife B, and it was a talked-about scandal for years afterward,” says Tom Smith, director of the University of Chicago’s National Opinion Research Center, which has researched adult sexual behavior. “It’s just not shocking anymore. Our TV images have gone from ‘Ozzie and Harriett’ to ‘Desperate Housewives.’ ”

Yet, 91 percent of those questioned in a Gallup Poll last year said affairs are morally wrong.

What gives?

Theories on who cheats and why abound among social scientists and jilted lovers, but those who have studied the issue are hard-pressed to come up with a one-size-fits-all answer.

Academics can’t even agree on the extent to which adultery is happening. Various studies have found anywhere from 15 percent to 70 percent of people have had sex with someone other than their spouse while married.

There is, however, consensus that men are more likely to be unfaithful than women, although the gap is closing.

“More women are in the workplace, are no longer dependent on their husbands financially, and they have more opportunities to meet new people,” said Dr. Linda Martin, a marriage and family therapist in Cocoa.

In “Not Just Friends: Rebuilding Trust and Recovering Your Sanity After Infidelity,” author Shirley Glass identifies five motivators — emotional intimacy, love, sex, ego and revenge.

“It has more to do with ego, excitement, opportunity, boredom or maybe being sexually frustrated with a spouse,” Martin said. “Affairs are certainly more than sex.”

Generally, men and women cheat for different reasons, according to Ruth Houston, author of “Is He Cheating on You? 829 Telltale Signs.” (Lifestyle Publications, $29.95)

“Women are usually looking for emotional fulfillment, and men are looking for sex,” Houston said. “Women tend to do it as a last resort after they’ve tried everything else, but their words have fallen on deaf ears.”

CheaterNews.com

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Jim Warren thinks revenge is a dish best served cold to the unfaithful — byte by vicious byte. That’s why he created the Web site www.cheaternews.com.

“Wouldn’t you go on the Internet to find out if the guy that you’re dating has had a past history of cheating?” says Warren, a business consultant from Redford, MI.

The heartbroken, the cuckolded, the bitter can all anonymously post profiles of their cheating former lover — though revealing cheaters’ full names, addresses, telephone numbers and e-mail addresses is prohibited.

In addition to alleged cheaters’ profiles, the site includes a list of signs your beloved might be cheating and links to Web articles on relationships.

Wanting revenge is normal, but Warren stresses that people hoping to reconcile with their cheating lovers probably shouldn’t try to publicly embarrass them via a Web site.

“A lot of people have a lot of hurt and anger, and if they don’t get an opportunity to release that somehow, they go on with the rest of life being bitter and angry,” Warren says.

“To have an avenue to release that, I think that’s good.”

Two Thirds of Married Women Imagine Affairs

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Married Women Imagine Affairs

The Chosun Ilbo Reports

If one day your wife looks out the window and starts smiling for no reason you can discover, it may be because another man is in her heart. “It started out of curiosity,” says 38-year-old Kim Yeong-mi (not her real name). Three months ago she met an old classmate through her Cyworld blog. They had dinner together, short dates grew into long drinking sessions, and one thing led to another.

“When I heard him say, ‘You’re still as pretty as ever,’ I felt like a woman for the first time in a long while. It had been ages since I heard that or got that feeling from my husband.”

The entire time she dated her lover, she felt pain thinking of her husband, her nine-year-old daughter and seven-year-old son. Yet each time she decided to break it off, she found herself waiting for her lover’s calls instead and arrived early at their place of rendezvous.

“I confessed to my friend, but she said to keep meeting him until I grew sick of him. Don’t break up your family, she said. She said there’s barely a married woman who doesn’t have a bit on the side these days.”

In a poll of 1,000 married women conducted by the Chosun Ilbo, the Korea Institute of Sexology, Pfizer Korea and Research Plus, 63 percent of respondents said they could imagine having sex with a man other than their husband. Some 21 percent said they were sitting on the fence, and only 16 percent said they could never sleep with anyone other than their husband.

Park Mi-jin (not her real name) is 43 and seeing a younger man despite being married for 15 years. “In the past, when I told my friends I had a lover, they used to say I was crazy, but now they say I’m clever.”

Chun Kyoung-hee of DeRyook International Law Firm says, “Fewer people now think of marriage as an eternal promise, so infidelity and divorce are rising rapidly.” As women grow more active in society and their economic power increases, their thinking about marriage and affection has grown freer, she said.

For a thesis on extramarital relationships, Sungkyunkwan University student Yang Da-jin interviewed 196 women in the Seoul-Gyeonggi Province area. “Of the respondents, 26 percent said they had had an extramarital affair,” she says. “The women were frank and unconcerned writing down their experiences on the questionnaire.”

Some attribute this atmosphere to TV dramas and movies that make infidelity look good. Since the 1996 drama “Aein” (Lover), women’s infidelity has ceased to be the stuff of controversy, with films such as “Happy End”, “Ardor”, and “Three Women” following the trend. The Internet, too, makes illicit relationships easier. Most of the respondents who confessed they had lovers said they met the men on school alumni sites or online chat. Psychologist Lee Eun-ha says, “The environment, like dramas and films, just helped break social taboos; infidelity on the part of women is rising as they grow confident that they can live on their own even after divorce thanks to their increased economic power.”

Choe Yeong-lee (assumed name), 37, who is having an affair with a colleague, said, “My husband thinks of me as someone who’s there to do housework, but my lover is always considerate of me.” What makes her stay with her husband? “My husband has had many flings with bar girls. We just pretend not to know,” she says.

(englishnews@chosun.com )

Catching The Cheaters in Texas

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Thirty-eight percent of marriages in the United States end in divorce. Infidelity is one of the top reasons.

With split-ups getting more costly, many are looking for ways to make sure they have the upper hand in court.

“If somebody does something out in public, your privacy rights are basically out the window,” private investigator Jesse Quackenbush said.

With cameras in cigarette lighters, binoculars and sunglasses, it’s pretty easy for private investigator Jesse Quackenbush to keep his eyes on cheaters.

“You can typically follow anyone, and its kind of funny how most people don’t expect they’re being followed or photographed or videotaped for that matter,” Quackenbush said.

A lawyer for the past 14 years, Quackenbush recently entered into a new side of the divorce business called Cheat Busters. Women and men hire him to spy on their spouses.

“We try to get them to go home and do a little self-surveillance themselves. To look at phone records. Look at credit card reports. Check for anything that seems unusual — hotels,” Quackenbush said.

News 36 spoke with one of his clients who wants to remain anonymous. She knew her husband was cheating even followed him herself, but, with four kids, she needed ammunition for court.

“I knew that none of my friends or family would believe that this was happening and so I wanted proof,” “Ann” said.

Proof is what Quackenbush got while drinking a beer, playing pool in the corner.

Quackenbush says in about 90 percent of his cases, the spouse is cheating. It only takes a few clicks for proof.

“There’s a variety of places where people think that they can meet safely. When in fact, they can’t,” Quackenbush said.

Cheaters in Texas