Your husband and the other woman: is it love or infatuation?

Sometimes I hear from wives that they are so hurt because their husband thinks that he is in love with the other woman or the lover. And the wife sometimes has to grudgingly admit that she can’t help but notice a change in her husband. He seems more carefree or optimistic. His perspective seems to have changed. He says that he hasn’t felt this good or this young in years.

I heard from a wife who said, “My husband has announced that he is in love with the other woman from his work and tells me that there is nothing I can do or say because he can’t help the way he feels. All of a sudden, he is being loving to our children and kind to their mother I feel like I have no recourse or way to defend myself My friends say that men only think they love the mistress because the sex is good and suddenly she has a little excitement in her life Are my friends right? Are men just in love with the other woman? Or can it really be love?

I have a definite opinion on this, but it’s probably not very objective. I have been the spouse who was cheated on, even though my husband had no illusions that he was in love. And I hear from a lot of people in this situation. As a result, it is my opinion that too often, men are infatuated rather than truly in love. I’ll tell you some of the reasons behind my opinion below.

To feel real love, it is necessary to truly know and value the other person as they really are: I would say that if you were to ask one of these men who were supposedly “in love” with their lover what it was that he loved about her, you would get some pretty predictable answers. Men will often point out her particular physical attributes (“she’s young and attractive”) or describe the way she makes him feel. Examples of this are things like “she understands me” or “she makes me feel alive.”

You will rarely hear him say that she is an honorable person with a kind heart or that he admires her strength and courage. And there is a very good reason for this. He often doesn’t know her well enough to know about these attributes. He only knows her on the surface. And her interactions are all about having fun together in the least amount of stolen time. Therefore, it is unrealistic to think that they will develop a real or meaningful relationship.

It’s easy for him to fall in love with the person he wants or needs her to be: Men often see a very distorted version of the other woman. In fact, he will often mold her into who he needs her to be in her own mind. See, he has to make her into someone who is really special because otherwise there would be no point in him risking her marriage or being so deceitful. Then he will build her up and project into her the things that he wants her to be his.

If he’s been feeling insecure about himself, suddenly she’s the one giving him confidence. If he has felt misunderstood or taken for granted, suddenly she is the one who really appreciates or understands him. If his wife doesn’t pay attention to what’s important to him, suddenly the other woman is the most observant and attentive woman in the world. But here’s the thing. Although all these thoughts and distortions feel good at first, they are often not sustainable. The longer relationships last, the more likely it is that reality will eventually set in. One day, he will see her with curlers or without makeup. Or one day, she will yell at you or make demands that show her true colors or the true nature of the relationship.

Reality is not as exciting as fantasy: The truth is that no person and no relationship is perfect. No one is going to complete your life except you. And men will often think that adding another woman or a new relationship to their life will suddenly make them happy when they haven’t changed anything in their lives or in their behaviors. True love that is rooted in reality comes from knowing all the facts about the other person, including their strengths and their flaws, and loving them all the same. True love comes when the other person needs you, even when things aren’t perfect or easy.

“Love” that is based on cheating and that happens while you are cheating on your partner is not real. It’s fantasy. It feels fun and exciting at the time, but guilt and reality often come calling. It’s very hard to feel good about the relationship deep in your heart where it counts. Because you know that you have lied and you have deceived who you promised to love the most. And in the quiet corners of your mind (when you’re not with that other person and experiencing the high of the new relationship), it starts to eat away at you.

So to answer the question posed, I think a lot of men are in love with the other woman because they’ve built her up to be who they need her to be at that moment. Of course, men sometimes tell me that her lover is now her wife and that they are blissfully happy with her new soul mate, but I think this is the exception rather than the rule.