... Even Though They Say They Never Would
If you asked a thousand single women if they would ever get involved sexually with a married man, about nine hundred and ninety-nine of them would say “No Way!” And yet, sooner or later, a lot of them will. Reliable statistics are hard to come by, but the consensus of infidelity researchers is that, at some point in their lives, about fifteen to twenty percent of unmarried women will have an affair with a married man.
{related article: after the affair: what to ask}
Why the big disparity between words and actions? Do single women want to project a “good girl” image in public, but be a “bad girl” in the bedroom? Maybe. But I think there’s a better explanation. I think that single women really are opposed---in the abstract---to having sex with married men. But once they get to know a particular married man, they stop thinking of him as “a married man,” but rather as “that sweet, nice-looking guy at the office who has that awful wife.”
It often happens accidentally.
Once a woman gets to know a married man and feel comfortable with him, barriers tend to disappear, often seamlessly. You begin by talking about work, then you start revealing things about your personal lives, then you do some light flirting, then you start casually touching each other’s arms or hands when you talk, then you stop off for a drink after work, then you start saying how frustrated you both are in your sex lives, then you start touching each other’s legs under the table…
{related article: can i sue the other woman?}
Neither of you planned it, but it happened. And for the next few weeks or months, or maybe for a year or more, your lives will be lived at the extremes: periods of intense excitement, followed by (much longer) periods of loneliness, guilt, and frustration.
At some point it ends, and it usually ends badly---maybe very badly. And it rarely ends in marriage. Only about three percent of married men ever wind up marrying their affair partners, and those marriages end disproportionately in divorce (often because the two people don’t trust each other to be faithful).
{related article: why powerful men cheat}
Prevention is key.
If a single woman genuinely wants to avoid having an affair with a married man, she’s got to monitor the interaction carefully. Flirting is fun, but it can easily escalate from innocent to sexually-charged.
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So, resist the temptation to tell him how great his body looks now that he’s working out regularly (which he’s probably doing to impress you).
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And don’t encourage him to be checking you out up-and-down and telling you that you ought to wear that tight blue blouse more often.
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If and when you have lunch or coffee together, keep the conversation focused on work.
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Don’t go out for drinks after work, even if it’s with a bunch of people from the office. (It always seems to start out with a big group around the table, and end up three hours later just the two of you, walking hand-in-hand to the parking garage).
{related article: is my partner's "office spouse" getting too close?}
Most affairs between co-workers are accidental in the sense that neither person consciously sets out to have one. The progression from friends to lovers typically involves a hundred small steps, some of them so small as to be unnoticeable. But if you step back and look at where a relationship is headed, the picture is usually pretty clear. And where it’s headed may be toward disaster---for you, for him, and maybe for other people you don’t even know.
{related article: the top 10 reasons for a successful marriage}
What's your take on the "accidental" affair? Has this happened to you? Someone you know? Why do you think single women go after married men, even if they say they never would? Share your stories!
Jim Duzak, the “Attorney at Love”, has spent his entire adult life dealing with issues of marriage, divorce, single-parenting, post-divorce dating, and remarriage. Mid-Life Divorce and the Rebirth of Commitment (Cold Tree Press, 2007) is his first book. Jim has also written and lectured about personal ads and online dating, and for many years has done one-on-one relationship coaching.
