Please feel free to E-mail me with your own comments on this issue or on anything else included in my Philosophy of Life section. I read your essay on adultery. No, but it soon becomes readily apparent whether or not our partners even want to try to meet our emotional needs. Please don't think that this is the only reason for adultery. The point of my essay is to question whether or not adultery is never justifiable and whether or not it should be a legal matter instead of a purely moral matter.
Many extramarital affairs go on for long periods of time.
Consider the famous case of the 12-year affair between Bill Clinton and Gennifer Flowers. There are many reasons why others are only short-term. Affairs that are purely about sex rarely survive after the initial thrill dissipates. Others end in all the normal ways that premarital relationships end. Certainly, there are many cases where guilt is involved and others where the troubled marriage is repaired or terminated.