Question for OW here!

[JimmyNorth]

5 hours ago, heartwhole2 said:

Thank you for sharing your story. I'm so sorry you experienced that.

I'm with you. I can't wrap my head around the idea that abuse is OK as long as you're not sure it's going to result in harm. Or substitute "taking away your partner's right to choose and their ability to ascertain what is real about their own life and risking their health" for abuse if you must. These things are OK as long as you kinda thought no harm, no foul? Is that really what we're arguing? Taking away someone's autonomy and right to consent is OK as long as harm (as judged by harmer) is not 100% guaranteed? It's only abusive if you for sure get a disease and have a miscarriage? Otherwise, it was just some entirely separate and compartmentalized occurrence that had nothing to do with you?

The whole point of affairs is that at least one person is being denied the right to consent. Otherwise they'd be called open relationships. Built into their premise is abuse. I'm glad people have such respect for the word abuse that they can't fathom that they could ever perpetrate it. I wish they'd have as much respect for human agency.

There was a time when I drank more alcohol than I realized (I was young and did not know that martinis are basically pure alcohol) and became belligerent, told my husband I hated him, and locked him out of the house. I could make all sorts of excuses about how I didn't know what I was doing, wasn't in control of my faculties, could have done far worse, etc. But who cares? It doesn't change what I did or who is responsible for it. It doesn't change my husband's right to a relationship where he is not misused and abused. It doesn't change my responsibility to own it and address the weaknesses that led to it happening. 

I can handle the fact that in one dark "perfect storm" moment I was an abuser. I am human. I have a capacity for great cruelty and a capacity for great compassion. It's up to me to nurture the qualities I want to have. It takes courage to look yourself in the mirror and admit that you chose to be a person who harms another. It's easier to minimize and rationalize, but that's how you started an affair in the first place. It may be a temporary fix for a shaky ego, but you shortchange yourself if you can't say, "What I did to you was not OK." When you really, truly understand that, you won't look someone who has been harmed in the face and argue with them about diction. 

Totally agree here! Starting the affair was wrong. I should have told my wife “Honey, I’m sorry, but we tried to fix our marriage but it’s not working and I think we should talk about separation”.  This would have been a much better option for all parties. My wife could have moved on knowing I was not mentally with her any more, my OW would not have ever been a secret and we could have started the relationship on the right footing!

Of course, as a MM, I messed that all up. I affected emotions of two women while I was being an idiot. This is why I’m preaching that all MM’s are not necessarily bad. Some MM’s make stupid decisions that are not meaning to be malicious or abusive. Are there abusive, serial cheating MM’s? YES, of course there is!!

To all the BS’s that have been hurt by a WS, I feel for you. It hurts and it’s not right to be left in the dark. If only your WS told you the truth before they ever took action on anything, then they wouldn’t be wayward. It may have still hurt that they want to leave, but at least they told you the truth and you can move on a tad bit easier.

[heartwhole2]

5 hours ago, JimmyNorth said:

Totally agree here! Starting the affair was wrong. I should have told my wife “Honey, I’m sorry, but we tried to fix our marriage but it’s not working and I think we should talk about separation”.  This would have been a much better option for all parties. My wife could have moved on knowing I was not mentally with her any more, my OW would not have ever been a secret and we could have started the relationship on the right footing!

Of course, as a MM, I messed that all up. I affected emotions of two women while I was being an idiot. This is why I’m preaching that all MM’s are not necessarily bad. Some MM’s make stupid decisions that are not meaning to be malicious or abusive. Are there abusive, serial cheating MM’s? YES, of course there is!!

To all the BS’s that have been hurt by a WS, I feel for you. It hurts and it’s not right to be left in the dark. If only your WS told you the truth before they ever took action on anything, then they wouldn’t be wayward. It may have still hurt that they want to leave, but at least they told you the truth and you can move on a tad bit easier.

I appreciate that. I would not have stayed with my husband after his affair if I thought he was irredeemable. I understand that affairs are human mistakes, and I can see why people fall into them. But like with my martini example, I also believe that people can be abusive even when they never meant to harm anyone. I believe in personal responsibility and agency. You can't change the past, but you can own it and learn from it. Are you going to heal relationships if you insist that the other person sees how what you did wasn't so bad? Or will you participate in a virtuous cycle where you try to see it from their eyes, and they in turn try to see it from yours?

Reconciliation is not for the faint of heart. You're dealing with trauma and abuse and a cheater who isn't good at facing hard stuff, hence the affair. For my husband to admit that, instead of being some kind of irresistible sex god, he was just a sad cliche who was doing two women wrong, was really hard. He would much rather mitigate the awfulness of what he did by holding up the affair as something special and blaming me for making him want one in the first place. He had a lot of shame that he buried under defensiveness and anger.

As I told him recently, he set in motion a scenario in which this was the best case scenario . . . years of hard work so that we could keep our family together. I understand that many people who have affairs have been unhappy for years, but there are also many who "discover" that they're unhappy when the enticement of sex with someone new presents itself. This was the case with my husband. I asked why he didn't just ask me to go to counseling, and he said, well he was having an affair, so it would have been hypocritical. But note that he didn't register being unhappy before the affair. And then after a week or two of NC with the OW, he "discovered" he was actually head over heels in love with me like we were "on our second honeymoon." Lucky me. 🙄 See, I knew what I deserved all along. I just didn't know I wasn't getting it because he saw fit to rob me of my reality and my right to consent or object. 

[mark clemson]

13 hours ago, MilaVaneela said:

I do consider his infidelity, especially because it had such disastrous consequences, to be on par with the physical and verbal abuse I had to deal with. Maybe it’s a case of YMMV, but I feel that to dismiss all instances completely has an underlying tone of “oh it’s not that bad when your partner cheats on you and hey it’s probably your fault anyway”. Perhaps I’m projecting a bit.

Mila, to be clear, I'm not at all interested in dismissing your (or other's) emotional pain or forgiving instances of genuine abuse. It sounds like in your case the affair took place within a larger pattern of genuine abuse, so perhaps in your specific case it could be considered part of it. Certainly I don't think anyone should just dismiss how you feel. To be fair to the point I'm making, it doesn't sound like your H was simply someone unhappy in their marriage and trying to find happiness outside of it through an affair, with no other harmful actions. It sounds like he was doing quite a bit more than just an affair.

It isn't the BS fault when their partner chooses an affair. THAT to me is logical. The BS may have (some widely varying levels of) responsibility for the WS's dissatisfaction, as does the WS themself, but the decision to have an affair in response is all on the WS. No argument there (at least from me).

[heartwhole2]

8 minutes ago, mark clemson said:

Mila, to be clear, I'm not at all interested in dismissing your (or other's) emotional pain or forgiving instances of genuine abuse. It sounds like in your case the affair took place within a larger pattern of genuine abuse, so perhaps in your specific case it could be considered part of it. Certainly I don't think anyone should just dismiss how you feel. To be fair to the point I'm making, it doesn't sound like your H was simply someone unhappy in their marriage and trying to find happiness outside of it through an affair, with no other harmful actions. It sounds like he was doing quite a bit more than just an affair.

It isn't the BS fault when their partner chooses an affair. THAT to me is logical. The BS may have (some widely varying levels of) responsibility for the WS's dissatisfaction, as does the WS themself, but the decision to have an affair in response is all on the WS. No argument there (at least from me).

I understand that you are not saying that marital dissatisfaction excuses infidelity, but discussing it at all in this context makes an association between the two. It's a common fallacy to associate dissatisfaction with a marriage with the reason someone is cheating. If I'm caught stealing from a store no one wants to hear my litany of grievances against the store. I'm only a thief because this store really sucks! I'm only a rapist because she walked in a dark alley alone at night dressed like that!  

It's not OK for me to beat you just because you really pissed me off. It's not OK for me to cheat on you just because you are a crappy spouse. We will never be healthy and whole if we focus on excusing harm rather than atoning for it. "Yeah, I harmed her, but you have to understand how she harmed me too." We teach our kids better than this at a young age. We teach them how to deal with their feelings when they are hurt, how to stick up for themselves, how to create and maintain boundaries. We teach them that two rights don't make a wrong. We teach them that you walk away when a situation is unhealthy and toxic.

It's harmful to frame cheating as something that depends upon context to determine whether it's abusive or not. It harms cheaters because it allows them to remain in a victim-mindset and to miss out on the joy and peace of healthy living and transformational relationships. Most of all, it harms the betrayed spouse who has been victimized and robbed of their right to consent.

[mark clemson]

Ok, but to be fair, in my view it's harmful to frame cheating as abuse AT ALL except under very specific circumstances.

 

17 hours ago, heartwhole2 said:

"I see no moral distinction between a cheater lying about an affair to hornswoggle their spouse into living a false reality, and slipping someone a roofie. In both situations it denies someone the ability to make their own informed choices...."

Everyone's "morality" is a bit different, as morality is by definition a personal thing. To me, claiming that withholding information, whether it's having an affair or in other contexts, equates to drugging and raping someone (we all know what happens after a woman is slipped a roofie) logically, ethically, or otherwise simply doesn't make sense. It would be like trying to claim a cherry is the culinary equivalent of a mango.

I'm not trying to say affairs aren't somewhat harmful (less when they're short in duration and remain undiscovered IMO). To me, equating them to rape doesn't make sense in the first place, and so trying to extend this view to claim abuse simply doesn't work. Much if not most of society, including the legal system, treats rape and affairs VERY differently. The labels involved are very different too.

For me, this conversation has always been about false labels. False labels are a problem generally in society - just ask anyone who's directly impacted by being labelled. I have blood relatives who experience this. I suspect you'd agree that isn't morally acceptable. False labels generally say much less about the labelled person and much more about the attitudes and biases of those who use them. While policies when applied globally, e.g. at a company, may be unnecessarily heavy-handed, people don't lose their jobs over "diction".

It's of course less of a problem here at LS, but I still don't think people who post who are APs/former APs should be labelled falsely. I recognize that you have your own views. But to me it's a symptom of the same issue - why would it be ok to falsely label APs as "abuser" and thus a criminal, in cases where they're not?

Both of us advise APs, former APs, OW, etc. I think there's significant (but of course not total) alignment in much of the advice we give. For me, I'll always want to give advice without implying that the person I'm advising is a criminal (unless possibly if they actually are one). If you came here posting, wouldn't you want the same treatment from others?

[Starswillshine]

Mark, the law handles physical abuse very differently than mental abuse and verbal abuse. Yet, they are still examples of abuse.

Same with drug abuse and so on. 

[heartwhole2]

Can you show me a definition of abuse that stipulates that it must be illegal?

[pepperbird]

2 hours ago, mark clemson said:

Ok, but to be fair, in my view it's harmful to frame cheating as abuse AT ALL except under very specific circumstances.

 

Everyone's "morality" is a bit different, as morality is by definition a personal thing. To me, claiming that withholding information, whether it's having an affair or in other contexts, equates to drugging and raping someone (we all know what happens after a woman is slipped a roofie) logically, ethically, or otherwise simply doesn't make sense. It would be like trying to claim a cherry is the culinary equivalent of a mango.

I'm not trying to say affairs aren't somewhat harmful (less when they're short in duration and remain undiscovered IMO). To me, equating them to rape doesn't make sense in the first place, and so trying to extend this view to claim abuse simply doesn't work. Much if not most of society, including the legal system, treats rape and affairs VERY differently. The labels involved are very different too.

For me, this conversation has always been about false labels. False labels are a problem generally in society - just ask anyone who's directly impacted by being labelled. I have blood relatives who experience this. I suspect you'd agree that isn't morally acceptable. False labels generally say much less about the labelled person and much more about the attitudes and biases of those who use them. While policies when applied globally, e.g. at a company, may be unnecessarily heavy-handed, people don't lose their jobs over "diction".

It's of course less of a problem here at LS, but I still don't think people who post who are APs/former APs should be labelled falsely. I recognize that you have your own views. But to me it's a symptom of the same issue - why would it be ok to falsely label APs as "abuser" and thus a criminal, in cases where they're not?

Both of us advise APs, former APs, OW, etc. I think there's significant (but of course not total) alignment in much of the advice we give. For me, I'll always want to give advice without implying that the person I'm advising is a criminal (unless possibly if they actually are one). If you came here posting, wouldn't you want the same treatment from others?

Mark,
I really do appreciate how respectful you're being in your discussion...much appreciated . You do present a lot of good points, and even if I don;t agree, I can't fault your logic.

I'm not sure where the "criminal" part comes in. There's very few cases of infidelity where the legal system would come into play, so let's remove that from the discussion.

I agree with the comparison to spiking someone's drink without telling them. It effectively removes a man or woman's fundamental right to have agency over their lives, and it is also a MASSIVE abuse of trust.
If I meet a guy who is also sleeping with someone else and know that, I can make informed choices about my life. I can choose to be with someone who is also monogamous, or I can choose to stay with him, knowing I am potentially exposing myself to risk. Maybe his other girlfriend has an STD, maybe she's really possessive and will come after me, I don't know.

I might buy a one night stand not being abuse. A one off that never happens again. A longer affair? It's kind of hard to see it otherwise.

I'm also somewhat perplexed by the stance that the men;women who are BS and share their stories on here are somehow anomalies, more painful than the rest. The "somewhat harmful" designation?

If you truly believe that, then I am not surprised you bristle at the use of the term "abuse". The reality though? An awful lot of BS have been hurt really badly. The majority don't post on here so one will never know just how bad it got for them.

 

[heartwhole2]

Mark, your arguments here come across to me as scattershot, as though you are so married to the idea that affairs cannot be abusive that you will throw out any defense. To state that it is a "false label," you must first explain how it is false to say that affairs are abusive. Of course affairs and rape are different, but they involve the inability to consent, which is part of what makes each of them wrong. 

Quote

 why would it be ok to falsely label APs as "abuser" and thus a criminal

You're marrying these two things based on . . . ????

Affairs are harmful to everyone involved. The cheater harms himself, his AP, and his spouse. It doesn't do a cheater any favors to mollycoddle them so they don't have to face how harmful, full stop, their actions are. They cannot grow if they are told what they did was "somewhat" OK. It is a kindness to speak truth to people, unless their goal is not to become their best selves but simply to avoid too much emotional distress caused by awareness of just how poor their choices really were.

I appreciate that the national domestic violence hotline explains that relationships fall along a spectrum. They describe healthy relationships as one where:
*You talk openly about problems and listen to one another. You respect each other’s opinions.
*You are honest with each other
*You make decisions together and hold each other to the same standard.
*You talk openly about sexual and reproductive choices together. All partners willingly consent to sexual activity and can safely discuss what you are and are not comfortable with.
*You and your partner have equal say with regard to finances. 

Unhealthy relationships involve:
*When problems arise, you fight or you don’t discuss them at all.
*One or more partners is not considerate of the other(s).
*One or more partners tells lies.
*One partner feels their desires and choices are more important.

Abusive relationships involve:
*One partner does not respect the feelings, thoughts, decisions, opinions or physical safety of the other.
*An abusive partner may try to blame the other for the harm they’re doing, or makes excuses for abusive actions or minimizes the abusive behavior.
*There is no equality in the relationship. One partner makes all decisions for the couple without the other’s input.

(I did not include all examples, just those that seemed related to adultery.) This is how they are explaining relationships to people trying to figure out if they are being abused. No relationship is perfect, but when we evaluate ourselves as objectively as possible we can see areas for improvement and work on them. We should always be aiming to be in the healthy category. Quibbling over how you should be given more credit for being not as far gone as other adulterers does not lead to health or growth. 

I keep harping on this because I think it is very dangerous to tell betrayed spouses that what happened to them was somewhat OK. The harm of someone finding out that, yes, they actually fit the dictionary definition of abuser is simply a matter of facing facts, taking ownership, and growing up. The harm of minimizing abuse is that the victim won't feel entitled to a relationship free of it.
 

 

[mark clemson]

Well, the reason I bring criminal into the discussion is because abuse (at least in the US) is often a crime. There can be kinds that aren't, particularly depending on the type and also the specific actions involved. The label, used in a marriage context, connotes a type of criminal act: spousal abuse which is a crime, at least in the US. While the technical term is domestic violence, they're essentially synonyms. A google search for "spousal abuse" will bring up domestic violence information. That's certainly how I read it.

I've thought about the abuse of trust thing a bit. This concept appears (at least from Wikipedia) to have varying definitions, depending on laws/legal jurisdictions, etc. I don't think it makes any sense to dive into all that, as we could probably debate this into the next century (and laws would evolve, etc). 😀  So, without getting too into the weeds, it appears that it generally requires authority over the other person (being a "person of trust"). So for example, having custody over a minor makes you a person of trust, which can then be abused. While I see what you're saying, I don't think this applies to a spouse (at least generally in Western culture) unless maybe they're incapacitated and you're looking over them or something.

All that said, I do think in normal speech it WOULD be fair or at least not unreasonable to say a WS abused the trust of their BS or similar. After all, that's what a betrayal is. So I think it wouldn't make any sense to object to a statement like that. Extending that to just say "abuser" though goes back to the issue above.

I actually don't think normal, secret cheating IS emotional abuse the way it's generally thought of. The reason is that the secrecy shields the BS from emotional harm (until discovered). I recognize that you all probably won't agree with that AND that you have a reasoned view on that (it sure DOES hurt when found out, the secrecy is mostly for the WS's benefit etc). Those things are certainly accurate and fair to point out.  I guess we agree to disagree?

(And I DO think that sometimes cheating genuinely IS a form of emotional abuse - particularly when it's done "openly" in order to harm the spouse or with the intent of eventual discovery for that reason. For example some revenge affairs might arguably be emotional abuse - I'm pretty sure there's some cases where I fully agree they are.)

Not to belabor the point, but again I would respectfully disagree that convincing someone that a non-criminal act is a criminal one is not at all necessary for healing, for someone to someone to take ownership of their actions, or for someone who's been hurt emotionally to recognize that they can and should move on to a situation free of emotional distress.

To me, the agency question is actually a separate issue, but suffice it to say I'm not entirely convinced that makes something "abuse" either.

I think going forward, maybe we just all agree we have somewhat diverging views and give advice with that in mind? (And I must reserve the right to interject if I think a statement's not really reasonable - others have that right with me.)

 

Edited April 21, 2020 by mark clemson
minor edit per HW2s last post

[heartwhole2]

If I meant criminal I would say criminal. You are trying to prove your argument by asserting an analogy that is weak and faulty.

And goodness, is that how we're supposed to decide how to treat one another? Hey, at least it's not criminal! 

Edited April 21, 2020 by heartwhole2

[MilaVaneela]

8 minutes ago, heartwhole2 said:

If I meant criminal I would say criminal. You are trying to prove your argument by asserting an analogy that is weak and faulty.
 

My final-final thought (I hope, ha ha and all involved may indeed agree to disagree but still I just would like to interject this one thing): 

Law enforcement usually only intervenes when domestic abuse becomes physical. They may cite for disturbing the peace if verbal abuse becomes particularly loud but the police aren’t going to come arrest someone solely for gaslighting and manipulating their partner... in other words, emotional and verbal abuse aren’t strictly “criminal” but that doesn’t make them any less harmful, does that mean that they aren’t really “abuse”? For many who have experienced both the physical injuries they suffered healed far faster than the emotional wounds, the lies, the manipulation, the constant verbal barrages. Not criminal =/= not harmful and I feel that trying to equate the two downplays the impact. 
 

Yes, yes, I know, “specific situations” and all that but... still. 
 

Okay, I’m done 😅 thank you all @heartwhole2 @pepperbird @mark clemsonfor this thoughtful discussion and  @JimmyNorth I hope you’re doing well. 

[elaine567]

I believe affairs are a form of abuse, but I also believe that many cheaters are abusers before, during and after the affair.
I would guess all types of abuse are common in such marriages, with the cheater being the perpetrator of that abuse.
If the treatment of the OW, ie someone they purport to love is anything to go by, I dread to think how they treat the wife they say they don't love...