Affaire gone wrong
“ I agreed to embark on a purely sexual affaire, with no expectations of exclusivity or commitment”
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Dear Philippa,
I have a problem I don’t feel able to discuss with anyone, because it’s largely my fault and would be very destructive if my friends or family found out.
My husband and I are both in our early 40s and we’ve had an incredibly stressful few years. I think we’ve been in ‘survival mode’ for a long time and we’re no longer physically intimate - he suffers from erectile dysfunction, which (as much as I know it’s not necessarily about me) makes me feel lonely and unattractive. Nonetheless, we’re good friends who care about each other and share three gorgeous children. We’ve been together 13 years.
I didn’t think too much about it until recently, because the rest of my life was so full-on. Then, late last year, I got chatting to a guy at a work-related function and gave him my number - genuinely, for totally innocent reasons. We started texting and he seemed likeable and funny, as much as I wasn’t quite sure what he wanted.
That soon became clear though. The conversation became flirtatious, then sexually explicit. He explained that he had a great relationship with his wife but wanted to try new things - group sex, parties etc - which she wasn’t keen on. They’d discussed it and she said it was fine, as long as it didn’t affect the marriage. Like us, they have two kids.
My husband would never have agreed to anything like that, but I liked the idea of recapturing my adventurous youth. We were going through a particularly difficult patch in our relationship and I was actually quite angry with him, so I didn’t even feel bad about it.
By this point, I thought of this guy as a pretty good friend. We seemed well-aligned in terms of interests, taste and sense of humour and, partly because I hadn’t thought of him as a potential mate, I was very relaxed around him. So I agreed to embark on a purely sexual affair, with no expectations of exclusivity or commitment.
He became a pleasant distraction from my various day-to-day stresses. In fact, he made me happy in a very uncomplicated way, which was something I hadn’t felt for a long time. We spent one evening together, had sex and I really enjoyed it. He’s still the only person I’ve had sex with in my 40s.
For about a week afterward, everything seemed fine. Then he started making excuses not to communicate, until it was clear that he just wanted me to go away. When I brought it up, he told me he ‘didn’t want to hurt anyone.’ We agreed to stop speaking - this was a few months ago and I haven’t heard from him since.
Part of me thinks I probably deserve it, but I am so hurt by the whole thing. He threw me away, like I was nothing.
The good news is that - because it was so out of character - the affair made me realise how unhappy I was in my marriage. We’re now having couples’ therapy and we’re getting on better than we have in a long time. I’m still hoping we can eventually rebuild our sexual relationship. I still don’t really feel guilty about what I did, but I do feel guilty about not feeling guilty, if you see what I mean.
Sadly, I still think about my affair partner every day. I’ve done all the ‘right’ things - deleted his number and any reminders etc, removed him from social media. How can I move on from this experience?
Many thanks,
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