Emotional Vs Physical Infidelity
By: Komal Singh
Tags: Relationships, Infidelity, Emotions, Cheating, Affairs

The word infidelity is scary for almost every one of us. We are scared that this is something that can happen to us any day. It is something that can’t be easily forgiven and often leaves a relationship in an irreparable state.

When it comes to types, infidelity is of two types: Physical and Emotional. Physical infidelity occurs when your partner is involved physically with someone else, and Emotional Infidelity occurs when your partner is involved in emotional intimacy with someone outside the relationship.

The question here is which one is easy to forgive? How it impacts a relation? Should we ignore emotional infidelity for the sake of a relationship?

Photo by @Google Images

With the growing internet and technology, emotional affairs have seen a surge. Many people have laptops and phones that make it easy to start an emotional affair without your partner knowing. It starts with an innocent friendship that eventually leads to a strong emotional bond. For some people, it’s a getaway from their day to day life and problems, and for others, it is fun. This emotional time-sharing with someone else poses a threat to people who are in relationships, especially the ones who are facing some issues.

One of the research conducted by Chapman University heterosexual men were more likely than heterosexual women to be most upset by sexual infidelity (54 percent of men vs. 35 percent of women) and less likely than heterosexual women to be most upset by emotional infidelity (46 percent of men vs. 65 percent of women).

I am sharing the story of my friends who dealt with emotional infidelity recently.

Rohan and Kaira dated for five years and then got married. They were best friends and the perfect couple. Rohan took a job that was demanding. The job used to keep him busy all the time, and he wasn’t able to find much time for Kiara. Kiara was also a working woman, and at the end of the day, she used to miss her husband with whom she used to share every sec of the day. For Kiara, Rohan was his go-to person.

Rohan’s demanding job started to create distance in their relationship. Kiara started to feel more and more lonely. They were living together but there was a lot of unsaid animosity between them. Rohan didn’t have time to discuss the problems they were facing with Kiara. This happened for few months, and then I think Kiara lost all hopes. She wasn’t happy.

Then I believe what I call an emotional affair started. Kiara and her broken heart started to look for a person with whom she can share her pain. She was able to see the light when an old friend pinged her on Instagram after seeing her recent photo. Their conversation started from there, and its frequency increased day by day. She was getting closer and closer to her new friend. She started to share everything with her friend. Rohan was also feeling that Kiara is growing distant from her. He noticed that she is always on the phone. The moment Rohan tried to confront her, she got annoyed.

If your partner is emotionally invested in someone other than you, he/she will show a DDD ( Dishonesty, Distracted, Distant)pattern.

Dishonest: Your partner will start lying to in order to cover up their affair

Distracted: You will find that your partner is always distracted or constantly chatting with someone on phone.

Distant: Your partner will start growing distant wherein he/she will stop sharing things with you, small mistakes can make him/her angry, seemed to be irritated all the time.

Kiara also showed all these signs. There was no doubt that Kiara loved her husband, but at the same time, she grew close to someone else. It’s not entirely Kiara’s fault but the truth is that she was involved in emotional infidelity.

Now, what should Rohan do? He also committed a mistake by pushing her wife into loneliness and giving work the priority. Rohan has to decide: Can he forgive Kiara and also look into his mistakes? Is he ready to work on their relationship.

Since they were family, Rohan decided to work on himself and their relation. He made Kiara realize what she is doing is not the right thing to do, and he also acknowledged that he was also responsible as he got drowned in her work. For Rohan, their relationship was very important and he took every effort possible to save it.

It’s is important to understand that people have different opinions about emotional affairs. For some people, it is as inappropriate or damaging as physical relation. For others, it is something that can be ignored or considered harmless. There are many couples for whom their relationship is the most precious thing, and they want to save it at any cost.

For me, it is difficult to forgive a physical affair but it is even more difficult to forgive an emotional affair. Emotional affairs can be more damaging for a relationship as your partner connects with someone on an emotional level. Your partner makes a strong emotional bond with someone else and often it is difficult to completely break that. A long emotional affair will one day lead to physical infidelity as well.