SAH/WOH--extramarital affairs

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-14-2004
SAH/WOH--extramarital affairs
1037
Tue, 02-15-2005 - 12:54pm

I was just at the gym this morning and overheard a conversation between two women on treadmills who were discussing/debating as to whether married sahms were any more or less likely to have affairs than married wohms.

I thought it would be interesting to hear your thoughts on this.

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iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Fri, 02-18-2005 - 6:29pm

God knows, that is the truth. Your sex drive or lack of sex drive is pretty much at the bottom of whatever list of traumas you are dealing with at that time.


What did you mean by this, though:


"In the absence OF the ability to make that last forever, some perfectly NORMAL people would prefer not to spend the rest of their natural life chasing after getting everything they had with their spouse back with some other person."


I have a feeling I am taking it really personally and defensively. I am taking it as, if you get remarried, then you are trying to relive your relationship with your spouse. If I ever get remarried, it would not be to relive my relationship with DH. It would be because I have resolved his death emotionally and I am ready to love again and share my life with another man.


Now, I know I never take anything wrong and I never take anything personally :)

"The dinosaurs became extinct because they didn't have a space program." Larry Nivens

"I do not want to be a princess! I want to be myself"

Mallory (age 3)

      &nbs

iVillage Member
Registered: 10-18-2003
Fri, 02-18-2005 - 6:30pm
Well, anything not used, is excess is it not? So unused horniness would be excess.

Choose your friends by their character and your socks by their color.  Choosing your socks by their character makes no sense and choosing your friends by their color is unthinkable.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Fri, 02-18-2005 - 7:05pm

Thank you for asking me to clarify. I appreciate that. Did you see the post to which I was responding? Felicia said it would not be "normal" to choose to be celibate if one became widowed. I thought Virgo had already explained very well the reasons why *she* might not be interested in finding a second spouse/sex partner, seeing as she would be at a completely different stage in her life with different feelings and priorities than she was when she married the first time, although she couldn't absolutely rule anything out.

No, I absolutely do not mean that anyone who remarries after they have been widowed are seeking to recreate relationship #1. My aunt was widowed and remarried a widower and it is obvious to me that the (excellent) relationship they share has nothing to do with their previous marriages (except of course that their current marriage wouldn't have occurred had they NOT lost their former spouses.) It is as you say, that they have gotten to the point where they could both hold their former spouses in their hearts AND joyfully love each other too. I just mean that it would not be ABnormal for one to feel that one had gotten all one could ask for, and more, out of one happy marriage, either. Point being, I don't think there IS just one "normal" path to choose after your world gets turned upside down. KWIM now?

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-19-2003
Fri, 02-18-2005 - 7:07pm
I'd bet that my statement is more often true then not true.
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-29-2003
Fri, 02-18-2005 - 7:07pm

Yes, you're right. I shouldn't have paraphrased FDE's opinion, and I got it wrong.

I also now think that I was wrong to pose a hypothetical question based on a situation that she is considering a possibility, although hopefully distant. So FDE, I apologize.

Congratulations! I'm so happy to hear it. I just heard the good news and popped back over, just in case you were still checking in.
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Fri, 02-18-2005 - 7:14pm

Yes, I do. Thank you for clarifying.


One of my pledges to myself

"I do not want to be a princess! I want to be myself"

Mallory (age 3)

      &nbs

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-25-2003
Fri, 02-18-2005 - 7:15pm

My mother became a grandmother at 41, my MIL became a grandmother at 40.

Virgo
 
iVillage Member
Registered: 08-19-2003
Fri, 02-18-2005 - 7:16pm

True. It's her choice of words that made me ask the question.

IMO "excess horniness" is a snide comment - like the desire for a sex life is a bad thing.

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-19-2003
Fri, 02-18-2005 - 7:21pm

And I hope they are!

I still bet that my statement is *more often* true then not true.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Fri, 02-18-2005 - 7:22pm
Maybe this explains something. Correct me if I'm wrong, but you sound like you view desire as a fairly stable byproduct of the endocrine system rather than a complex interaction between particular people that is very dependent on circumstances.

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