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I was watching a show that discussed emotional infidelity—having an ‘affair of the heart’ without necessarily moving to the physical level. The consensus was that an emotional affair is worse than a physical affair. (assuming one can split the two, of course).
They said 97% percent of the women surveyed felt that an emotional affair would likely lead to a physical affair.
Warning signs that you are entering dangerous waters include increasing your communication with this person, thinking about this person a lot, and fantasizing about that person. The experts on the panel also said that often, a person enters an emotional affair when the sex life at home has fizzled out a bit.
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Ok
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So, I start to thinking (always dangerous)…
What if a person is having all the physical encounters they want and need at home, but is searching for intimacy/friendship? What if the primary relationship does not lend itself to sharing secrets, joys, pains, etc?
How is it bitching to your best girlfriend different from bitching to your best guy friend?
I am one that is against ‘male bashing’ and ‘husband bashing’. I think its mean and cruel.
But I imagine that sometimes, a person has an issue they would want to talk about, or is not receiving the emotional support they need at home.
I suppose there is always therapy. But a therapist costs money, and a therapists goal is going to be to teach you to rely on yourself.
What if you just want a sympathetic ear? Is that emotional infidelity?
And what if you do fantasize about another person? Does that make you a cheater? Does it matter if its Brad Pitt vs. the sexy guy who delivers your mail? Does it matter if its a stranger or a person you’ve known your whole life?
The Shangri-La’s got it right when they sang their teen-angst anthem “Leader of the Pack.”
He was a bad boy, the leader of a pack of hooligans, but he had a heart of gold and loved the good girl. Of course, he died, and now she will love him forever.
Sigh.
What is it about the consummate bad boy that sets so many hearts aflutter?
Having experience with bad boys, I have a few ideas.
I think that we as women always want/hope to be the one who ‘changes’ him. He is sweet, loving, says all the right things…..as long as you are alone. So what if when you are out with his crew or your friends he lacks manners, or uses terrible language, or sits sullenly…or whatever he does that doesn’t fit into mainstream ideas of interaction.
YOU and YOU ALONE know that beneath that tough demeanor beats the heart of a lover, a poet, a secret romantic….
(a player.) (but we keep that thought in hidden brackets, and try hard not to think about it)
Or maybe its just that as a ‘good girl’, the chance to walk on the wild side is too tempting to pass up. He is so different than your “standard” man…he takes risks, he lives on the edge. Enough to give you shivers, isn’t it? (anyone remember the movie Cry Baby?)
Of course, there is the darker side to our bad boy.
Sometimes we pick one who is really bad. Whoops. Suddenly you are involved with someone who smooth talks you into believing what you know is not true….to deterious end. And you end up in a tangled relationship with someone in serious trouble, or you end up in trouble yourself. (remember this movie?)
Of course, maybe that’s the draw. The scent of danger, the excitement of the edge.
Why do so many of us still lust over the bad boy? I personally had my fill of them and married a nice, upstanding good man. Sure, our life has fewer risks, fewer edges….but there is a huge security in knowing to my soul he is truthful and honest and true to me.
And that heart of gold is true gold, and not the fool’s gold of my past bad boys.
So what about you? Do you still have the craving for the bad boy? What experiences have you had? Why do you think that the bad-boy has such hold on women?
Remember being a teenager, and getting a crush?
My daughter is 14 and has been ‘crushing’ on boys for a few years now. I can always tell because she starts mooning around the house. Generally she will lay on her bed staring off into space, or sleep a lot, or jump to answer her phone when it rings. She gets giddy and actually enjoys interaction with the ‘rents.
Of course, we’ve seen the dark side of a crush here too. She also moons, but in a distinctly different way. Her staring off into space is generally puncutated with angry sighs, and she seems to text much more. She becomes moody and withdrawn.
Ahh yes..teen crushes.
She crushes on celebrities too. Whereas I papered my walls with pictures of Ralph Macchio and Scott Baio, my daughter has pictures of Daniel Radcliffe and Robert Pattinson all over her room. And while I spent my time laboriously slaving over writing just the right fan letter (who knows! The right words might earn me a ::sigh:: autographed picture!), my daughter has only to click a few links on the ‘net to leave her heartthrob a love note.
And I never received my autographed picture of Scott, Ralph, or any of the other teen hotties of the late 70’s and early 80’s, my daughter did receive an autographed picture of Daniel Radcliffe, which is proudly displayed in an 8X10 frame and is quite possibly the only thing in her room that she dusts.
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I think about all this and I miss the magic. The ‘will he or won’t he” and the “does he or doesn’t he” stage. Going to school wondering if this week’s dreamboat will write me a note or leave a note for me in my locker. (Of course today they all text each other, but its the same concept!) As an adult, I miss that sense of adventure and the feeling of “anything can happen” that a teenage crush brings on.
I admit I do have one crush….its Johnny Depp. Really and truly and ever since I was 18. What’s scary is that my daughter has been crushing on him too, since Edward Scissorhands. Now there is some interesting mother/daughter bonding. We went to see “Sweeney Todd” together and we have the CD and DVD. We will always choose a Johnny Depp movie over just about anything else, although in the last few years, Harry Potter won out on my daughter’s side. (she came around when Sweeney Todd came out though.)
Now what about you? C’mon, fess up…who do you crush on?
Is intimacy overrated? Can you have a sexual relationship without all the bells and whistles of intimacy?
Sex when it’s boiled down to basics is really just a body function (albeit a very nice one!). However, there are other things involved with it…hormones, emotions, love, lust, attraction, body image, self esteem, comfort…I imagine that list can go on.
When you factor in all the above, it makes it seem like there needs to be a degree of intimacy in order to really be able to ‘let go’ and enjoy yourself. I mean, can you really concentrate on how great you feel if you are wondering about your thighs in the lighting?
But then again, if there is no intimacy…do you care what your thighs look like?
I’ll admit, I’ve been married for…oh, a long time! I am ‘out of the loop’ on modern sexual and dating practices. I am interested in your thoughts and perceptions on the topic of intimacy…
Please comment, let’s get a dialog going! I look forward to your responses. (And yes, I want to hear from women AND men!!)
The other morning, I was luxuriating in bed after a couple of really long shifts at work. The morning talk shows filtered thru my cobwebby brain, and I was floating on a sea of (rather unprintable) dreams.
Something they said on tv, however, caught my attention and I began to listen.
Apparently there are websites where one can have an alter life. Like “Sims” or some such. You can choose your avatar, your clothes, your livingspace and lifestyle…you all get the picture.
To make it all that more (profitable?) (delicious?) (tempting?) interesting…you can choose to have virtual sex as well. This isn’t the ‘old fashioned’ virtual sex where you are typing back and forth. Nope, here you can also have hot, steamy, virtual sex with your other online friends.
On Mike and Juliet they discussed the pro’s and con’s of online virtual sex. The man featured, one of the creators of the Second Life website, apparently has his ‘real life’ wife and then has his ’second life wife’…and he shares ’second life sex’ with her as well.
Stranger still, his real life wife came on the show to support him! (He IS raking in the cash of course.)
So huh, what do you all think?
Is this a new form of pornography? Is this just a natural outcropping of the ongoing virtual sexual revolution?
Is this cheating?
