SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I read posts on here about APs who have sex in crazy places and go to ridiculous lengths in order to be together. they convince themselves they are soulmates and talk at length about the magical magnificence of their love.

And today I find myself wondering... does that shit only happen in extramarital affairs?

I mean, even at the height of new relationship schmoopiness, I have never in any of my relationships had sex in a parking lot or a closet. One could argue that they have too much class for such activities, but today I find myself wondering what it would be like to be with someone who wanted me so much that he couldn't wait to get home to have me.

Is A passion real or an illusion?

I think it is easier in affairs because the APs really don't have respect for each other. They are able to let go of inhibitions and a and act out what seems like scenes only found in movies.

With open honest communication of wants and needs, I think it is just as possible in a M.

I have often said that affair relationships have very little in common with dating relationships.

That's something that many BS get hung up on.

They assume that the affair was something like what they remembered while they were dating.

Well...for the most part they are nothing like that.

In my FWH's case the MOW was a serial cheater and was very experienced in knowing what an affair is like.

She basically cheated throughout her 30+ year marriage.

When my FWH's office moved to her office building she had an opportunity to troll for fresh candidates-and my FWH was just turning 50 and was a ready and willing participant.

Her come on?

She whispered that she want to blank his blank! (charming huh?)

It took one year of this kind of nonsense (in a professional work environment) before the LTA began.

She told him that she would fulfill any sexual fantasy that he had ever had.

So...all of the sexcapades were kinky and IMHO somewhat ridiculous.

1/2 of the encounters were limited to BJs in a beat up old car in the exact same bar parking lot after work.

All the other encounters happened at work related conferences and trips.

And of course it involved lots of emails where there was a whole big build up for each upcoming encounter.

(I think the build up and fantasy is a big turn on to many LTAs.)

They would have these work trips a few times per year.

But the OW would start the emails 3 months in advance.

"What will you do to me?" "I will do this and that to you"

blah blah blah....

I spoke with the MOW's BH after d-day and even met him in person to exchange email evidence.

And guess what?

Just as I suspected...this middle aged sex maniac was not so hot to trot when it came to having sex with her own husband.

Perhaps if she had put 1/2 as much effort into enticing her own husband as did enticing other women's husbands...then she might have had a much better marriage?

Instead she always pursued married men. The LTAs followed the same pattern. No reality was allowed to creep in.

No discussions about kids, their spouses,finances, problems, etc.

It was one huge fantasy bubble.

Nothing like a dating relationship where you do meet each other's families and friends and do have much more day to day interaction.

In my FWH's case the LTA encounters were limited to drinking and sex.

No romance, no flowers, nothing like anything that I would want to be involved in.

I would guess that the romantic schmoopie affairs were also just one big fantasy bubble.

That's why so few affairs turn into real relationships.

The attraction was the fantasy and the escape.

The affair partners were not the type of people that they want for life partners.

This is especially true of LTAs.

If they wanted to build a life with that person they would have ended their marriages etc.

Instead they never make any kind of committment to the AP because they only see them in this one dimensional role.

Damncutekitty....think back to the beginning of your dating life when you were young and idealistic and had zero commitments, also when those relationships were fresh and new and exciting. I thought long and hard and I remember my WH being excited to see me and me him. I remember sexy discussions that were major foreplay. I remember being so hot for each other we couldn't wait to be alone ( difference here...I respected myself enough to wait until we were alone at either of our homes or a hotel).

Then boom...marriage, house, school, new jobs, financial worries, the new roof is more important than spending money on the sexy lingerae, commitees, extended family concerns, aging parents, and the list could go on and on! You may have still been hot for each other but time and life got in the way.

Interestingly enough, when I read many of the SI stories it is the WS that puts that effort in somewhere else hence the A. If they had just quit saying they were to tired or too busy at home to their BS and put a little effort in, the old excitement would have resurfaced, and excitement is contageous so we BS may have taken those few extra pennies and bought the expensive lingerae. Unfortunalty most WS want the gratification without the work, and a new "exciting" relationship provides that.

I think A passion is both real and an illusion. It is real because that passion can and will happen in any relationship with a little effort and in any NEW relationship . It is an illusion because they don't realize that it is because all the real life stuff is not in the way...if they leave the WS for the AP eventually the passion fades as real life takes over. Hence the reasoning that if they cheated with you they will likely cheat on you!

I agree that neither of them have any self respect.

Early in our M I tried asked to have sex in a car, but she wouldn't risk being seen. It was perverted.

20 years later and it's OK to do it with a stranger and didn't care who saw it.

I have thought about this as well.

My H and I did have this kind of sex while dating and after M. The thing is, I never wanted or liked it. I felt disrespected, I felt un cared for, I felt used. But I also was very young and stupid, so I always talked myself out of my feelings, telling myself that I was wrong to feel that way etc.

Truth was, he did not respect me, his urges and desires were way more important than me and my need to be treated with respect and not pushed outside my comfort zone, risk of embarassment, etc. It should have been a red flag, big time as to who he was, etc, but I was way too young and dumb and came from a family that taught me to doubt myself, and not question others, men especially.

So, to me, from this pov, I see what WS and AP do in this regard as just an acting out of the very real disrepect they have for themselves and each other.

I think that people who truly love and respect each other really care about the other and want what is best for them, do not want to "risk" their welfare or embarasment etc. They really care, so those kinds of things do not happen as much. The desire for each other is there, the barely able to keep hands off each other, etc, but it is tempered with "protecting" the relationship imo.

Of course if both parties really wanted to have sex in those types of settings, I see no problem with it, but I think it would still be "different" than A sex, because again, I would see respect for each others welfare, etc to be involved, whereas in an A that is basically non existent imo. It is about getting what one wants for themselves, the gratification, the passion, the quickness, the lust, the feeling desired, the "specialness", the secret, the illicitness, whatever.

Also, in some M, I think a spouse cares so deeply about what their spouse thinks of them, they might fear rejection, or negative comments if they spoke of wanting something like this, so they keep it to themselves. But with an AP, they already have such a HUGE secret with them, and they really do not care about the AP as much that it is easier to share such things without the fear of rejection etc, there is a sort of warped sense of implied acceptance because they both know they each are "cheaters" already, they have shared the dark self which they might feel they cannot share in the M.

Grace

I don't believe it only happens in extramarital affairs, but it probably is more likely to happen in affairs, because of the secretive nature. A lot of times the sex in cars happens because there is nowhere else to go.

I also don't think having sex in a car instead of waiting to get home should be any indication of how much a person wants another person. Personally, I'd much rather have the anticipation continue to build, knowing my SO wants me, while we drive home.

does that shit only happen in extramarital affairs?

No, but the heightened dopamine does give it an obsessive component, where he/sex is all you think about ... and your job and real life suffers. I mean when you're running around buying new underwear and shaving parts of your body that only one other person is going to see -- and your hot partner is reinforcing that behavior at every opportunity, it's easy to focus on pleasure to the exclusion of everything and everyone else.

Yes, you can have passion AND respect ... but when it burns that hot, it cannot burn forever.

Well I say no it doesn't just happen in affairs and doesn't mean you have no self respect.

My husband (not the one who brought me here) and I recently had sex in a parking lot for no other reason than we wanted each other and it was fun. In fact our son was conceived outside.

We have bills, money stress, six kids, work, dirty house and all the other non-fun stuff but we still make time to have fun with each other.

WW here...hope I don't offend or trigger anyone by popping in here but I have a sincere answer.

For me, looking back, I was desperately lying to myself as well as my AP. To get what I was seeking, I needed, I HAD to convince my AP that I was the things I wanted to see myself as. I needed those things reflected back at me from the magic mirror that was the AP.

Also, after all the ridiculous communications back and forth during the EA time period (when had myself convinced that I would never take it physical so it didn't matter what stupid claims I made), when I followed that path of destruction and took it physical I felt I had to live up to the fake picture I had painted. I mean I couldn't disappoint my "soul mate" by not living up to my "WORD".

So if he made a comment that I was sexy or exciting or that he thought I was probably a wild woman...I felt compelled to be those things. It was a compulsion. I wanted to believe I was cool, fun, sexy, exciting, whatever he *thought* I was. It's very freaking sick and sad and nauseating to look back at.

I think that's where a lot of the risky behaviors that aren't the norm in a cheaters married life come from. We are ACTING like someone we are not.

ETA punctuation

[This message edited by knightsbff at 4:57 PM, October 12th (Saturday)]

KnightsBFF-

That may have been the most illuminating post on the subject that I've ever read. Thanks.

like knightsbff said, people in A's do things in order to keep it going. In my case, Mr. HBH talked on the phone with A P until the wee hours of the morning. During our entire M, he never wanted to talk with me very long on the phone. Since AP had young children and they had to keep the A secret, they had to carry it on after her children were asleep. (He was not living at home bc of work, so I didn't know he was on the phone at night.)

Depending on the person, they do things while in an A that they would never do in a M.

Hmmmm. If I play the "I've never had sex <here>" drinking game.....I end up drunk. With stbx, I've had sex:

In a parking lot

In a closet (multiple times....along with the bathrooms in my house. He's an early bird, I'm a night owl, we have 3 kids. You do the math)

We even had sex once in one of the bathrooms of a mansion on the lake during a charity event.

It was more about being spontaneous than passion.....

((((DCK)))))

IMO, since affairs are empty things full of bullshit it is all about the fantasy.

I saw a FWW in another post state that the OM never asked her to pick up preparation h on the way home... it is all about creating an alternate universe where there are no responsibilities, nothing real exists.

In my case, my WH and I had the type of sex life where closets, parked cars, darkened theaters etc were our playground if only for foreplay. He still cheated. We sexted while he was at work. He still cheated.

His needs were met. And he still cheated.

I do know you can drive yourself crazy trying to analyze them. I have just come to accept that I don't speak their language.

I think it is a combination of different factors.

1) Sex in crazy places happens a lot when there is nowhere else to go. I did that kind of BS a lot when I was younger and couldn't bring a date home because my parents were home...couldn't go to his house because his parents were home...so there was the car or the dressing room or a closet somewhere. I think a similar phenomenon happens with affairs- they can't go home because spouse and/or kids are there. So they have to settle for somewhere else. They convince themselves that it is about passion...but really a lot of the times it is because they don't have anywhere else to go for free (sure, they can go to a hotel room but that gets expensive).

2) They are people who have little respect for each other or themselves. So while I might be super offended if my husband (or a date or whatever) suggested we have sex in a car or somewhere public- they don't bat an eyelash at the idea. If they were mature and respected themselves and their partner and were really "making love" then they probably wouldn't be sneaking around having an affair in the first place.

3) Honestly, it is laziness on behalf of the cheating spouse (s).

And the WS is being lazy. If any of them put half the effort they spent lying and sneaking around with their AP into rekindling their own marriages instead...they probably would have found a lot of what they were looking for in the affair. Instead, they found someone else for that sudden "rush" of feelings and didn't have to do any work to get it.

Having sex in a car, or a closet...it's laziness. Laziness in the sense that it isn't taking the time to go somewhere private, or wait for somewhere private, or pay for somewhere private. Laziness in the sense that an yo the WS's could have chosen to leave their marriages (they were SO miserable anyway, right?) but didn't. The couple having sex in the closet or in the bathroom at work or whatever may SEEM super passionate any risqué, but I argue that it is more about laziness in planning instead.

Great post knightsbff.

I do think that's one thing that happens. They get caught up in having to fulfill this fantasy image ...once the train has left the station...they feel obligated to follow through with what they had promised.

beyondbreaking -you are correct about the parking lot sex. It's not always about the passion. In my FWH's case it was laziness.

They could have gone lots of places. They could have gone out for drinks somewhere private. They could have gone to a motel.

Nope. Same car. Same bar parking lot. Same quick BJ.

Only once every few months.

Because it was easy and required no thought.

My FWH called it a routine.

Why the MOW agreed to this I have no idea.

I guess she was so desperate for attention that she was willing to put up with all kinds of stuff.

Knights BFF and Beyond Breaking, those are really really good points.

I have been living with my SO for 6 months now. I guess I'm just surprised how fast 'real life' took over and it's had me wondering.