But We Didn’t DO Anything….the Emotional Affair
October 4, 2008 by Marye Audet
Filed under Relationships
The debate continues. Can a man and a woman just be friends? Many say that they can. I tend to agree with Billy Crystal, in When Harry Met Sally.
Harry Burns: You realize of course that we could never be friends.
Sally Albright: Why not?
Harry Burns: What I’m saying is – and this is not a come-on in any way, shape or form – is that men and women can’t be friends because the sex part always gets in the way.
Sally Albright: That’s not true. I have a number of men friends and there is no sex involved.
Harry Burns: No you don’t.
Sally Albright: Yes I do.
Harry Burns: No you don’t.
Sally Albright: Yes I do.
Harry Burns: You only think you do.
Sally Albright: You say I’m having sex with these men without my knowledge?
Harry Burns: No, what I’m saying is they all WANT to have sex with you.
Sally Albright: They do not.
Harry Burns: Do too.
Sally Albright: They do not.
Harry Burns: Do too.
Sally Albright: How do you know?
Harry Burns: Because no man can be friends with a woman that he finds attractive. He always wants to have sex with her.
Sally Albright: So, you’re saying that a man can be friends with a woman he finds unattractive?
Harry Burns: No. You pretty much want to nail ‘em too.
Sally Albright: What if THEY don’t want to have sex with YOU?
Harry Burns: Doesn’t matter because the sex thing is already out there so the friendship is ultimately doomed and that is the end of the story.
Sally Albright: Well, I guess we’re not going to be friends then.
Harry Burns: I guess not.
Sally Albright: That’s too bad. You were the only person I knew in New York.
In our modern society men and women often spend more time with the people they work with than their spouses. Conversations begin, confidences are shared, and pretty soon you find that you are more emotionally intimate with the guy (or woman) in the next office than you are your spouse.
He seems to understand you, to listen to what you have to say, to find you interesting and fascinating…
Or, maybe it is just an online thing. You are on a chat board or forum and you begin bantering back and forth with someone. It leads to emails. Pretty soon you are sharing problems and sympathizing with eachother. You realize there is some sort of connection there, but afterall, you aren’t really doing anything…a little harmless flirtation never hurt anyone right?
Maybe you even laughingly call it your little cyber-affair. It doesn’t count because it isn’t in the real world.
Wrong.
Everything we do begins in our mind. It begins as a thought. And…an emotional affair can bring as much pain into a marriage as a physical one. After all, it is the thought that counts.
Spending time alone with a member of the opposite sex is like walking on the edge of the cliff. If you stumble you are gonna fall.
AOL got me thinking about this when I happened to read Decoding the Emotional Affair . Gauge your relationships against the questions in the article and see where you are at. But be honest.
I remembered a close friend I had all the way through high school. He was usually dating someone, and I was usually dating someone..and we never really got together romantically. We were just friends. We spent time together. Maybe he was off when I was but our boyfriend/girlfriend was working or busy. We would hang out..go to the lake, hang at his house (his mom loved me) or my house (my mom loved him). If we didn’t have anything to do we might get a little physical because, well, it didn’t mean anything ..we were just friends.
He helped em through breakups I helped him through breakups..I even dated his brother for a little bit.
When Marc and I got married I introduced the two of them…and it became very apparent that my friendship was going to interfere with my marriage. Not because Marc is the jealous type..I wish he was a bit more jealous to be honest with you…but because I could feel a bit of emotional confusion within myself, and my friend made it clear to me that he felt the same.
Sometimes I miss my friend, although it is nearly 30 years later. But that friendship was not worth my marriage, nor any of his relationships. We would not have made it as a couple and I never regretted my decision to pull back.
Our new poll is simple… For October…can a man and a woman, especially those in committed relationships to other people, ever safely be friends?
Image:Morguefile
I have no clue. Friendship is usually where affairs begin.
My husband and I are friends with a guy. He’s my husband’s best friend and I’m friends with him too, but it’s not a close friendship. We met him when he was still single and now he’s married. I guess I am friends with him, but since my husband is friends with him too, it’s not the same as just he and I being friends. That would make it very awkward.
Karen, I thinkhaving a friend as a couple (that you don;t spend any time with alone) and having a friend that is just yours are two different things.
If you could keep the emotions out of it, but you can’t. If married, ony if you were 100% open and honest about your contact, thoughs and conversations could you make it work…and my guess is few would be willing to do that. The moment you eliminated your spouse from the equation you have committed an emotional infidelity. Just put yourself in your spouses position…get the picture?
I think it is possible for a man and a woman to be friends, but so long as they are unattached to other people of the opposite gender. Unattached meaning, they have no emotional involvement with others.
There’s one way you can be close friends with a member of the opposite sex while married…I have a good female friend at work, and my wife is totally fine with our frienship–because the woman in question is a lesbian.
Perhaps. If it works then great!
Marye,
Wow- this sounds like my past. I had a VERY close male friend through high school & college. After college, we were still close, though we lived in different cities. We were also the one’s who helped each other through breakups etc as you described above. My friend distanced himself, even broke all contact with me once my husband & I got engaged. It was hard for me, but I, too, wouldn’t put that friendship before my marriage. I still miss him sometimes and have looked for him on MySpace & Facebook and have even emailed him, but after 5ish years, no contact from him at all. Thanks for posting this blog.
you’re welcome! thanks for stopping by and thanks for commenting!
I completely disagree.
I work in a very male dominated field and have many male friends. I am married – some of them are married too – but not all and our ages vary as well.
I have a few closer male friends – I am very clear – they are just friends and I know they feel the same way.
Not all the males I work with are my friends – just like not all the females I work with are my friends either. They are simply my friends because we share something similiar.
I have always had male friends and seperate boyfriends my entire li1fe – high school, college and now my professional life.
Perhaps thoses that find friends of the opposite gender difficult aren’t really looking for JUST a friend – but perhaps something more.
Perhaps, Andrea, or perhaps you are unusual in your situation.
I don’t really know. I’m an bachelor (directed here by my high school youth pastor for some reason?), so I haven’t really been in this place before. But I do know how I personally am with my female friends. As much as I’d love to think that marriage is mentally and emotionally exclusive—that is, completely focused on each other with no distractions—I seriously doubt that’s the case. Based on how I tend to think (at least at first) about my girl friends, I seriously doubt I could maintain a good friendship with a girl without at least a little conflict. And if my wife became jealous, then what? I would obviously choose her at the expense of the friendship, but then again the emotions are so chaotic by that point that damage is done regardless.
I agree with Karen on the couple friend thing. That seems like it would work.
My parents have a wonderful marriage. Except for the summer after adopting my little sisters, I don’t think they have ever had a serious issue, and they’ve been together 21 or 22 years now. My mom has told me some of the things he does to ensure his faithfulness and integrity, and they are quite honorable.
For instance, on business trips he will not ride in the same car as a female coworker unless there is another male in the car. Even if it means spending twice the gas money.
When I was a kid and my siblings and I needed a babysitter, he would take my little sister along when he drove the sitter home so there would be a witness and accountability, should there ever be a problem. (And all this time I thought she just liked being in the car.)
If these are the things he does with acquaintances and high school girls, then it must require so much more effort to keep a friendship without problems, especially since friendship tends to be more exclusive than an acquaintanceship.
Shmo…those are important safeguards. We do much the same..when I have to email with a man I will generally send a copy to Marc, and he will send copies to me when he has email contract with women…
Most of all, I think, we prefer eachother’s company over anyone else.
“…Sally Albright: So, you’re saying that a man can be friends with a woman he finds unattractive?
Harry Burns: No. You pretty much want to nail ‘em too…”
LMAO! True. Not only that. I cast a bit of a jaundiced eye at the kind of ‘ friends through it all ‘ pap that women, in particular, seem to buy into.
I was reading someplace about this group of female friends who’ve been together through marriages, divorces, affairs, childbirth..etc., etc., through the tone of the article, it seemed like the group of ‘friends’ had a higher level of stability/importance to the respective members than did primary relationships like husbands and children.
I suppose with that attitude/belief system going into it, a marriage would be bound to falter when it encounters some of the really hard obstacles all marriages face at one time or another
Maybe I’m wrong…
cheers,
I think that true friendships between men and women just have to stop at a certain time in your life, and that time being when you are committing yourself fully to another person. I’ve switched from relying on my guy friends for advice to turning to my brother. He knows me better than any of them anyways.
I am at a point in my life where I am not yet married, although in a committed relationship, but to someone who doesn’t feel the same way I do about this issue. I am hopeful that he will come around as the relationship progresses for him. If he does not, I do not know what I will do then. Marriage truly is a huge step, and I’m not willing to go into it with anything but forever in mind.
SV- I think, hard as it may be for you emotionally, that is wise. It is important to recognize that things that you don;t like before marriage probably won’t change after..and if it is something you can’t live with you are better off knowing it now.