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Cheating is relative. While physical intimacy is the most popular type of cheating that is a deal breaker to many, emotional cheating is way deeper on another level.
Emotional cheating is an affair of the heart. It is the emotional intimacy between two people that have bonded closely in a romantic way but never being physically entangled yet.
Most times, sexual feelings in an emotional affair is often denied to maintain the illusion that it is just a special friendship. Although emotional affair tends to be very common like sexual affair, many couples and even singles in relationships have strong emotional involvement with another person without physical intercourse.
Emotional affair often starts as friendship, and it progresses towards attachment, confiding more in each other, talking deep secrets, and then it progresses to more intimate emotional feelings with the new partner than with their existing partner. You start to feel dependent on the emotional high that comes with the relationship. The obsession, anticipating phone calls, emails or text messages keep you going.
The problem is the attachment to this other person impacts your marriage or relationship thereby draining energy and fun from your primary relationship. You spend a lot of emotional energy on the person.
While emotional affair may not be physical (sexual) yet, sexual and emotional chemistry can present itself based on a physical attraction one feels for the new person. It can also be related to an increase in dopamine, a hormone that produces feelings of pleasure, and nor epinephrine, which is similar to adrenaline which causes an increase in excitement. This feeling may lead to physical intimacy only if nurtured and sex happens quickly after the first physical contact because you have become vulnerable due to the high level of intimacy and unspoken attraction already existing between the two.
Something is missing that makes you vulnerable to temptation. People in stable relationships find themselves thinking a little too much about a particular person. It could be a friend of a friend, a co-worker, an ex or an acquaintance. You have never gone anything beyond a hug, but you still wonder if there’s something more to how you feel on the inside.
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An unfaithful spouse may spend inappropriate and much time with someone of the opposite or same sex on phone chatting. An individual who invests more emotionally into a relationship with someone besides their partner, the existing relationship may suffer. Deception and secrecy takes over because those involved are likely not to tell their partners about the amount of time they spend with the other person online.
There is increased fighting and constant bickering because the partner is emotionally involved with a third party, perceiving the new person as all good and their committed partner as not good enough, and this takes a toll on their relationship. Often, people who become involved in emotional affairs feel something is lacking in their present relationship. So, it makes them feel good because they feel understood and desired by this new friend.
For some people, finding out about an emotional affair can be worse than discovering sexual infidelity. Truth is that sexual acts most times do not necessarily contain affection or intimacy. It could be literally about relieving oneself of sexual tension. Whereas emotional affair is much more about being connected, about loving, liking and a sense of feeling wanted and protected. Unlike a platonic friendship, in an emotional affair, there’s sexual chemistry between the two or some sexual fantasies playing out in their heads. You may even be sharing unflattering details about your present relationship with this new person.
If you find yourself fantasizing, having intimate conversations, sharing information you should be sharing only with your spouse or partner, sending late night flirty texts, missing someone else even with your partner right next to you or you are becoming more deeply invested in imagining what could be with this person, then it’s not just an innocent friendship. There is a difference between platonic friendship and craving someone. When you crave someone your mind, body and soul behave in a certain way.
If you fit into the descriptions above, and you have not taken the relationship to a physical intimate level yet, you can make a turn from that emotional affair, call it off and work on your actual relationship. Look deeply, an emotional affair could be a symptom of an underlying problem in your life or your relationship. For couples to survive emotional infidelity, both partners must explore its roots, find out what exactly they are and address the weaknesses than confide secretly in someone else.
Avoid playing blame game, identify contributing factors on both sides. Give the love, attention, appreciation, and affection you both desire to save your relationship or marriage. If you are honest with yourself and not willing to fix what is wrong in your real relationship because you know you deserve better, then maybe it’s time to re-evaluate your relationship or move on.
Emotional affair is way deeper than physical intimacy because sex is actually the lowest form of intimacy.
