Welcome!

[Mod Team]

This forum is for all participants in an extramarital relationship, be it the married man or woman, the other man or woman, or the married other man or woman.

We want to offer a safe environment where you can communicate with others who have been where you are, who understand what it is like to be a participant in an extramarital relationship. We do our utmost to preserve such an environment.

We on this forum believe that by lending support to each other, giving a listening ear, strenghtening self esteem, each individual is supported in finding a path of their own choice. Only the individual can in the end know what is best for them. We do not judge, we support.

Some of us stay in the extramarital relationship short term, some long term. Some of us end the affair, some of us end the marriage, some end both. Some of us get married to our affair partner.

Some of us are in great pain, others have gone past the decision point and are here to offer support and advice from the depth of their experiences.

The posts below are written by members of our forum, expressing how many of us women and men participating in extramarital relationships feel.

We hope you will want to join our community. Welcome!

I don't encourage people to rush out and seek As, though I don't stand in judgment of people who do. I would be a hypocrit if I did, since I did that myself and it worked very nicely for me. I don't encourage people to stay in affairs that are bad for them, just as I don't encourage people to stay in marriages that are bad for them or in any other kind of toxic relationship. To me, the dynamic of the relationship and the values of the people in it are what matters, not whether the name of the relationship has society's blessing or not. And I refuse to become reformed simply because I'm now married. I don't sell out my values because my circumstances change, and I don't look down on people who are where I was just a short while ago.

I've never understood the term cheerleading affairs.  Ffs who of us would encourage anyone to start one?  Most of us know that although there are a lot of high points to an affair there are usually many more low ones and I personally would discourage anyone from starting one!  That said, I'm having one, lol, and its great to have people to discuss it with and not feel like a marriage breaking whore.

This might sound sexist (and I don't care if it does) but for me, a core of my masculine identity is to be a protector/provider. It has taken me awhile to see it that way but has been true since I was a boy. I don't know if its cultural or innate and really it doesn't matter. When a woman trusts me I want to be worthy of the trust. From the Boy Scouts to Superman, when the Titanic sinks its "woman and children first!", and a real man will speak reassuringly as he drowns on their behalf.

But the world is not such a simple place. And as a man I have desires and wishes and long for someone to understand me completely and to let me understand completely. One for whom I need not fear the revelation of my hidden side. Oh but to choose that! To break the trust of those that trusted you! To protect them I lie a little while the transgression is small. Talked with another woman; no big deal. Met her; a lie of omission. Kissed her, slept with her, loved her? How did I get here! Now I lie to hide the depth of the betrayal. To protect against the effect of its knowledge. To continue to provide. What kind of man betrays a woman's trust? What kind of man am I?