There Is an Inaccurate Definition of Exit Affairs Floating Around the Internet
“We are never so defenseless against suffering as when we love.” Sigmund Freud
Dear Sincere Medium Reader, maybe you can help with some confusion. I pride myself on my research skills. If I read a fact, I check it with other sources. Any type of study or psychological advice better have the degrees behind it. So what is my big hoo-ha about? It appears I was using my interpretation of the term, exit affair. Others have a totally divergent definition.
I discovered in another Medium article, a writer claimed that an exit affair was a deliberate act to force a partner into a divorce. This made no sense to me. So I kept googling. I found many infidelity sites that also used this definition. Now granted they all were lifestyle infidelity articles. I kept trying to find a psychology today, medical, or other research studies that used this same definition. One law firm had this explanation of an exit affair on their website:
The unfaithful spouse does not communicate their desire to end the relationship and instead chooses to have an affair, hoping that it will provoke divorce.
In my mistress group, we have often discussed exit affairs. We all were under the impression that an exit affair happens when a person engages in an affair and consequently discovers they want to end the marriage. In ten years of communicating with adulterers, I have never met anyone that did this act deliberately to end their marriage.
I’m not naïve. I do know there are horribly cruel abusers that emotionally devastate their spouses. Some do so by having affairs. I would never defend or even offer compassion to such people. The articles that claimed that these exit affairs were intentional discussed characteristics such as the cheater being too chicken to end the marriage and they want the betrayed spouse to end it. Or the cheater refused any honest conversation and instead used the affair to communicate their dissatisfaction. One lifestyle article wrote that the cheater is afraid of being alone so they have an affair to be able to move directly in another relationship.
Again, I’m not denying that these types of assholes exist. And yes, Angry Reader, I agree that it is a responsibility to confront the issues in the marriage. However, in my anecdotal long-term study of adulterers, I believe this type of person is rare. Here’s why.
Everyone I ever corresponded with was trying to hide their affair:
This doesn’t match up with the person that wants to be caught so that their spouse will get angry and divorce him or her. Why would a person try to hide their affair? The reasons are complex and would encompass a totally separate article. But in a nutshell, adulterers don’t want to get caught because they don’t want to blow up their home life. They want to stay married. Yes, sometimes it is only because of the children. But other times it is because they still love or care for their spouse. The sexual compatibility might be gone, but there are many other factors that keep them wanting to stay with their spouse.
Many cheaters have communicated with their spouses about the problems in the marriage:
Surprise! Surprise! Almost every adulterer I’ve known has discussed their dissatisfaction in the marriage with their spouse with mixed results. Sometimes things will improve for the short term only to fall back into old patterns. Many have also gone to marriage counseling. Or see their own private therapists. To say that all cheaters refuse honest conversations is not accurate.
Often times a cheater will break up with the affair partner when they’re caught:
As I wrote above, I ran a mistress support group for a number of years. I can’t begin to count how many group chats, all-night text messaging sessions and even video calls with distraught women who were dumped after a D-day. Some of these married men did wind up divorcing after a period of time. But it wasn’t an exit affair. Because they tried to save the marriage after getting caught.
Back in January, I wrote an article titled, I believe that most affairs are exit affairs. This was, of course, my interpretation of what an exit affair is. I have often found from others’ stories that affairs wake a person up. Many people know they are unhappy in their marriage. Some of us are conditioned that anything can be fixed by working on it. We also are more affected by society’s definition of relationships than we realize. Therefore, we are going to stay in the marriage and make it work no matter what! Unfortunately, it is when a person steps out of the marriage, that they then realize they aren’t being authentic. They become truly aware of the problems that just can’t be fixed. Because not all couples are meant to grow old together.
The cheating spouses that try to stay in their marriage after a discovery day often find that out. Hence why I wrote an article that explored how many marriages cannot be saved after an affair.
But that, Rational Reader, is not the point of this article. However, it is why I am proclaiming that the definition of exit affairs being floated around the Internet is not accurate. An exit affair is when a person engages in an affair and then realizes they want to leave their marriage. The type of affair where a cheater is looking to deliberately end a marriage should be changed to a term like Premeditated Affair.
If we want to understand affairs and offer comfort, counseling, and healing to all affected, we first have to correctly define what has happened. In my humble opinion, there is a big difference between an exit affair and a premeditated affair.
Sincerely, Tullia Freud.
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