The Loving Truth

Why Can’t I End My Affair?

• Sharon Pope • Episode 117

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You know the ‘right’ thing to do. You know the ‘logical’ decision. So why is it so hard to end your affair relationship? 

In this episode, I’ll give you 5 reasons why you’re struggling to end an affair—and I’ll start with a hint… you’re not making this decision with logic! That’s not how you started the affair, and it’s not how you’re trying to end it. 

Listen in for another “loving truth” about this deeply profound and important moment in any relationship that’s experienced an affair (on either side). 


Struggling to decide whether to stay or go in your marriage and you’re serious about finding that answer?

Book a Truth & Clarity Session with a member of my team. We’ll discuss where you are in your marriage and explore if there’s a fit for you and I to work together so you can make - and execute - the RIGHT decision for YOU and your marriage.

Speaker 1:

Welcome to the Loving Truth Podcast, where it's all about finding clarity, confidence and peace in the face of marriage challenges. And now your host relationship expert and certified Master Life Coach, sharon Pope. Hello, loves, this is Sharon Pope and this is the Loving Truth. Today, we're going to be talking about why it's so difficult to end an affair. All day, every day, I talk to people about affairs, whether it's their own affair or an affair that their spouse had. Sometimes, believe it or not, both people have had affairs or some version of betrayal, and for sure, it is some of the most brutal, heartbreaking and challenging work that I do. But I will also tell you it is the deepest, most profound and most rewarding work that I do as a relationship coach, because to be trusted with someone's secrets is a real trust between two people, and being able to help someone navigate one of the most confusing and challenging times of their lives is really a privilege for me that I never take lightly. So when someone is involved in an affair, look, they know what they should do, right. They know what the right thing to do would be. They know that it would cause unimaginable pain to their partner if their partner found out. So why is it then so hard to end an affair? Logically, we understand what we should do, so why aren't we doing what we should do? Well, my friends, human beings don't often do what we should do. We only do what we need to do. Do what we should do. We only do what we need to do.

Speaker 1:

So sometimes, when you're trying to end an affair, you might break it off, but it only lasts a few weeks, or maybe a few months, before you two are back in contact with one another. You know, sometimes it's under the guise of we need closure one another. You know, sometimes it's under the guise of we need closure. Sometimes it's likened to a drug, because think about it for a second the context of an affair is pretty intoxicating, right, there's risk involved, there's adventure, there'sness, and anything that's unknown creates desire. So that can be pretty intoxicating. And so then we liken it to a drug, but then, even using that language of it's like a drug that I can't turn away from takes away our power. It's like it's something that has control over us that we don't have control of inside of ourselves. And so whenever that's the case, I always just want to understand it a little bit more. So the reasons why someone gets involved in an affair. Those aren't logical. So the reason that someone is going to end an affair affair also not going to be logical.

Speaker 1:

It is our emotions that get us involved in an affair. It's our emotions that keep us in an affair and sometimes help us justify that affair, and it is our emotions that keep us from detoxing and ending an affair, and that is why it can be so incredibly challenging. So I've compiled what I think are the five biggest reasons why it is so challenging to end an affair, and so the first one is because an affair is an escape. There's something that I'm avoiding, and most of the time there's something that I'm avoiding, and most of the time it's I'm avoiding the challenges in my marriage. I know that the marriage doesn't feel good or is not meeting some of my deepest needs, but I don't really want to address that, I don't really want to deal with that, and so this is a way for me to distract or avoid the challenges in my marriage. Now, we're not making that choice consciously, like no one wakes up in the morning and says, yeah, I don't want to deal with that, so I think I'll go out and get involved in an affair. That's not how it happens, but that's ultimately what's happening underneath the surface that we're not really able to see very clearly. But be very clear about this An affair is an escape from something.

Speaker 1:

Sometimes it might even just be ourselves and something that we don't want to deal with within ourselves. Sometimes it's something in our lives, sometimes it's something in our marriage, but there's something that we are escaping. So if we get rid of that escape path, then it sort of puts us squarely back in front of ourselves or our marriage or the thing that we're avoiding, and so that's why we don't want to end the affair. So that's the first reason. Reason and this is a big one, folks is that when you're involved in an affair, we create a whole story about what it could be, what it would look like and feel like if we were together, where we were both physically available, emotionally available, to be together in a relationship. This is how it would look and this is how it would feel and this is how it would function and how we would operate. We have this whole storyline about how it would be and how. Of course, this will last forever, because this is like a soulmate relationship and look, sometimes it is a beautiful relationship, but the only way to ever know that is to actually be in a relationship with that person. When you're both emotionally and physically available to be in a relationship Like some people refer to it as being in a real relationship like your affair is never going to feel like a real relationship.

Speaker 1:

I hesitate to use that language because it is a real relationship, but there's a huge difference between stealing away private moments in secret with someone and living your daily life alongside someone right, living together, watching each other pee every day, seeing each other's bad habits, paying bills, navigating hardships together, blending families together and seeing how the dynamic between your kids and your new partner or you and in his kids right, like that's a whole different deal. So living together and having what some people would call a real relationship I guess I'd call it like a functional relationship of living alongside another human being that is never going to feel like all the juice and intoxicating vibes that you get from something that is secret and hidden and new and unknown and exciting and risky. Those are two very different feelings, right, but we've created this whole story in our minds about how it's going to be, like I'm going to keep all these intoxicating feelings even though we're functioning inside of a functional relationship, and those two things don't often go together, my friends. So we've created idea. Right, let's be clear you have no idea what this relationship will feel like when you actually start functioning together. You don't know. It could be great, it could be a shit show, we don't know. You know how you will know. Is it if you actually try? You know how you will know. Is it if you actually try, if you actually are available to be in a relationship with this person and you try?

Speaker 1:

There's no guarantee, just like there's no guarantee with your marriage. But our minds create this whole story and this whole projection and this whole idea of how we think it's going to be. And it's all just a story, it's all made up. But the mind can be a very powerful thing, and that's one of the reasons why it's so hard to turn away from an affair, because we've created a whole story that our minds can't really tell if it's real or not real. But our minds can't really tell if it's real or not real. We believe that that is possible and, of course, anything is possible. But is it probable, is it likely? Do we actually know?

Speaker 1:

I think in so many ways affairs are us hedging our bets, right, like we're looking for that guarantee that I'm going to have what I want in my most intimate relationship and right now this feels closer to what I want than my marriage does. So the third reason why it's so difficult to break off an affair is because usually inside of an affair we feel deeply seen and deeply understood in a way that we don't feel inside of our relationships. Now let's think about why that might be Like. Why can you feel so deeply seen and understood by someone that maybe you just met a few months ago or a few years ago, versus someone that you've spent a decade or two decades with? There's something called shared trauma.

Speaker 1:

Now, I used to think it was called trauma bonding, because when I think about the phrase trauma bonding, it sounds like two people bonding over their traumas, but in fact that's not the definition of what I'm talking about. What I'm talking about is essentially where you share your traumas and then, because you have similar traumas, you feel so deeply seen and understood. Right, when we see ourselves in someone else, we feel understood and it creates a connection. So let's say both of you are married and feeling disconnected and lonely in your marriages and you come together and you share that with the other person and they're like, yeah, me too, and here's my experience and here's this experience, and you both can understand each other's pain so well. It doesn't have to be that. It could be a shared trauma of the fear of being abandoned, you know or not feeling desired, and now all of a sudden feeling desired and you both meeting each other's needs in that way. But it's like when we can understand someone else's pain and we can identify with that pain, there's a thing called shared trauma. That then bonds us together and that's why we feel so deeply seen and deeply understood. That doesn't make it healthy, my friends. Right, because you both have traumas that you're not dealing with and you're just using this opportunity to feel understood Like it's great to feel understood, we all want to feel understood but that doesn't mean we've dealt with the trauma that the other person is experiencing. So it doesn't make it healthy. It just makes us understand what's really happening here and why we feel so pulled to this relationship.

Speaker 1:

Number four the fourth reason why affairs are so difficult to break off is because we use what I would call some pretty squishy language around our breakups, don't we? Right? We say like I need to take a break, or I'm going to go try again with my spouse, try again, or I just can't keep doing this right now. Right, we use language that hedges our bets. Why do we do that? Let's be honest, we're not entirely sure of our decision to end the affair, and really what we want is for our affair partner to hang out and wait for us so that again we can hedge our bets, like, if I go back in and I try in my marriage and it doesn't work out, I still have this plan B. That's what we're doing. It's like calming our anxiety and feeding our insecurities.

Speaker 1:

We use squishy language, and so that's why we go a week, two weeks, three weeks, maybe two months, and then we're reaching back out again and saying, oh, we just have no control over it. No, it's because we used really squishy language. There wasn't finality in the language we often don't say. Things like this is where we have to say goodbye, I'm glad to have known you, but I need to move on with my life and I need you to move on with your life. That's much more final language, but, to be honest, I've never once heard one of my clients tell me that they've said that to their affair partner. It doesn't mean that they haven't ended it, it just means they're not using that language right. So you got to think about the language that you're using.

Speaker 1:

And the last reason why affairs are so difficult to pull away from and I feel like this is such a rich topic that is not talked about enough and that is that what we are most drawn to inside of an affair, believe it or not, it is not this other person, this affair partner. We think it is, we think it's them and we think it's the space between us, the relationship between us that is so very special. What we are most drawn to is who we get to be inside that relationship. That's really what we're seeking, right? So, just like someone's, a fair partner is almost always the polar opposite of their spouse, and the reason for that is because they have those elements in their spouse. They're not looking for what's missing in the marriage, or they are. They're actively. They're looking for what's missing in the marriage. They're not looking to replace their spouse.

Speaker 1:

So your fair partner is often very, very different than your spouse. So your affair partner is often very, very different than your spouse and likewise, who we are in our affair relationship is very, very different than who we are as a wife and a mother inside our marriage. So it's all about who we get to be right. If, with my affair partner, I'm adventurous and I'm curious and I'm passionate and I'm alive and engaged in life, that's someone that a lot of, of course, you want to be around that. But then when we go home, who are we? Do we bring that same passion and aliveness and curiosity and a sense of adventure to our marriage? No, no, what we often are focused on is what needs to get done, the whole to-do list, who's shuttling who where right. It's like being a mother making sure everyone else has what they need. It's like tending to everyone else, but over here I get to tend to myself. I get to have something for myself.

Speaker 1:

So, my friends, I think the biggest reason why it's hard to pull away from an affair is because of who we get to be inside that relationship versus who we're bringing to the table inside of our marriages. And that doesn't mean that we can't do that, but we've got to become conscious of it first, otherwise we're never going to do it. So I think that that awareness is actually a gift, because what you're, what you're saying, is that there's a part of you that is tired of being repressed and wants to be fully expressed in your life. You just think it's with him, you just think it's with this relationship, right? And so then what we do is we, we hand over all of our power to that person, right? Like if I'm not with them, I'm never going to feel this way again. Oh no, no, that's not true.

Speaker 1:

Your feelings come from your thoughts about your experiences. They can't insert themselves and make you feel something like insert themselves into your life and make you feel something that's not a real thing. Your feelings come from your thoughts and your experiences, and so you have an experience with this person, you have thoughts about it, and that's what creates that feeling. And as soon as you own that, you start to realize I'm in charge of how I feel, it's not about other people, and so then I get to choose how I show up in every single one of my relationships. But as long as you keep handing over your power to this other person, then you will, of course, need their presence in your life, because you've created a story that their presence is what gives you that feeling that feels so good to you, that part of you that wants to be expressed. So I say, take the gift of what is it that wants to be expressed and how can I apply that more in my life in a real, genuine, authentic sense, regardless of who you're with, right, that's just an awareness that has come into your experience that I don't think should be ignored. All right.

Speaker 1:

So there are many really valid reasons why it's really hard to pull away from an affair, but I think the more you can see them clearly then, the easier it is to make sense of what you're doing and why you're doing it, so that you can make more conscious choices for yourself, right, so that you're not just operating unconsciously and saying that you have no power and it's like a drug that you can't pull away from. I think you have way more power than you give yourself credit for these reasons that I've offered. They're very real and they feel very real in your experience and you get to choose one way or the other about whether you remain in your affair or you don't. I just want you to be able to understand what you're doing, make conscious choices and why you're doing it and you got to like your reasons because it's your life and you're the one that has to live with it, right? So I don't come at it from a place of judgment or what's right or what's wrong. I just want you to live your life in a really authentic and conscious way so that you feel good about how you're showing up in your life.

Speaker 1:

So, my friends, if you are struggling and feeling really confused in your own affair because that's what it does it brings a lot of confusion and a lot of drama. There's like if your marriage was struggling before, boy, now you're really struggling because now you've got to figure out feelings for two different people and there's a lot at stake. Or if you've just found out about your partner's affair and you're struggling with that experience and with the betrayal and you might be wondering why has it been so difficult for them to pull away? Why can't they just cut it and come back and be fully present in this marriage, which was their first commitment, right? It's hard to understand that when you're on the other side of it. So, regardless of which side you're on, I want you to know that I can help you.

Speaker 1:

Okay, this might be your first affair that you're dealing with. It's probably my 2000th that I have seen with all of my members inside my community over the course of more than a decade of doing this work right. So there's a lot of commonalities there that I see and I know that I can be helpful to you and, like I said, although it is really challenging work, it is also incredibly rewarding work. So if that speaks to you and you'd like my help, you can always go to clarityformymarriagecom. That's how you can take your next step forward to see if there's a fit for us to work together.

Speaker 1:

All right, folks, I hope that that was helpful for you. Until next time, please take really good care. If you're listening to this podcast because you're struggling to decide whether to stay or go in your marriage and you're serious about finding that answer, it's time to book a Truth and Clarity session with a member of my team On the call. We'll discuss where you are in your marriage and explore if there's a fit for you and I to work together so you can make and execute the right decision for you and your marriage. Go to clarityformymarriagecom to fill out an application now. That's clarityformymarriagecom.