In 1977, Avodah Offit wrote a popular book entitled The Sexual Self that became a favorite among many sex therapists. I’m not endorsing the book (I haven’t actually read it), but she has a quote in it that I wish I would have read before I got married:
“My experience indicates that most people become infatuated or fall in love with others an average of six times in the course of a long marriage.”
Six times sounds like a lot to me, but when I found myself very attracted to someone else rather early in my marriage to Lisa, I was caught completely off-guard. It made me think something was wrong with my marriage, rather than that such feelings are normal and even predictable. Not being fore-warned, I wasn’t fore-armed. It would have been so helpful for me to know thirty years ago not to freak out. Perhaps I would have managed it better than I did.
If you’re committed to cherishing your spouse for life and suddenly find your mind fixated on someone else, there are many wrong responses and several right ones.
The first wrong response is to assume something is wrong with your marriage, in the sense that you need a new marriage. For us Christians, trouble in our marriage is more like finding out we have heart disease. In all but the most serious of cases (abuse, unrepentant infidelity) we should seek to repair the heart instead of search for a new one. If you don’t understand that additional attraction is normal you may think that because, momentarily at least, you seem to have stronger feelings for someone else than you do for your spouse, the marriage must have run its course. But just like with a physical heart (where you can bring cholesterol down and alleviate high blood pressure before you seek a heart transplant), so in marriage you can treat the underlying weakness before you jettison the relationship.
In a sacred marriage, the marriage isn’t over until God says it’s over. Your feelings for this other person that you’re not married to don’t mean you no longer have a deep commitment to (or even love for) your spouse; your emotions have just been caught off-guard. That’s all it is. That’s what emotions do. In other words, don’t make the infatuation more than it is. Arm yourself with this understanding: if you get a divorce and marry this new person and stay married for a long time, you’ll eventually become attracted to or infatuated with someone else, maybe even your current spouse! (Don’t laugh. I’ve seen it happen with other marriages.) Infatuations inside and outside of marriage are momentary storms. It’s foolish to cancel your summer vacation because of a winter storm warning. Just wait until it passes.
The second wrong response is to be caught by surprise. Imagine a heavyweight boxer working out for months, strategizing for his next fight, then freaking out when he takes an uppercut that makes him woozy. A good trainer will tell him in advance to expect and then overcome that hit—clinch your opponent, stall for time, get your full consciousness back as soon as possible. The champion boxer will have a plan for when he gets hit.
In marriage, an infatuation or attraction for someone else is like that uppercut. It’s part of the game—much more common, apparently, than I realized, if Offit is to be believed. We’ve got to learn how to respond rather than let the uppercut take us out. When it happens, figure out how to recover instead of just falling down (we’ll address that in a moment when we talk about right responses).
The third wrong response is to feed the attraction or the infatuation. The famous three elements of building a relationship—time, talk, and touch—must be guarded against, religiously. Suffocate the affection. Don’t feed it. Deprive it of everything that normally builds a relationship. If you slip off alone and have a meal together “to talk things out,” you’re creating a romantic tsunami that may become more powerful than you can handle. Sneaking around creates an intimacy that feeds the infatuation and feelings. “You and me against the world” becomes a romantic notion instead of the nightmare scenario that it is. In such cases, it’s not just “you and me against the world,” it’s “you and me against God,” and that’s a dangerous place to be.
So, the three wrong responses are, don’t assume it’s the end of your marriage; don’t be caught by surprise; and don’t feed it.
The Right Responses
Lisa eventually found out about the first time I became infatuated with someone else because it became a big mess, much to my own discredit and fault. The second time, Lisa never knew because I was prepared and knew how to handle it. I went to my godly, wise friends. I was part of a great accountability group we called “the Pacific Rim” because it consisted of a Japanese man, a Korean man, and a Chinese man. I was the token white guy. I think every young husband should have friends that are following the Lord like these guys.
Right away I let them know what was going on. It was at a conference, and absent “artificial contact” I wouldn’t see this person again for about another year. We jokingly called her the “elevator girl” because that’s where I met her. It would have been possible to track her down if I had a “work” question, but my friends and I had agreed, “We’re not ever going to do that, right?” And they’d check up every now and then to make sure nothing was going on. I’m such a terrible liar—I’d lose everything I own if I tried to play poker—so there was no chance of fooling these guys.
I was surprised at how quickly and how easily this second attraction was managed. Without it being fed, it died a rather predictable and easy death. There’s been nothing else remotely close to it in the past couple of decades, so I don’t see how I can get to Offit’s six—and I hope I never do.
No doubt, focusing so intently on cherishing my spouse certainly keeps me distracted from possibly cherishing someone else.
Here’s what made the difference: I saw the attraction as a threat instead of a fantasy or escape. I knew it had to be guarded against instead of fed. I knew I needed to ask for help and reinforcements. And I knew, from past experience, that it could pass and it needn’t threaten my marriage. It didn’t even have to frustrate my marriage. It never reached the point where I or the guys thought I should even talk to Lisa about it, because it was never a big deal.
For her part, Lisa has experienced this just once and, like me, was caught totally off guard. “No one ever warned me that this happens,” she told me years later. “No one talks about it.” I tried not to take it personally that he had a ponytail (you can take the girl out of Seattle, but you can’t always take Seattle out of the girl).
Add both of us up, and our marriage has faced this three times. The lesson learned? Don’t take it too seriously when an outside attraction or even infatuation happens to you, and don’t take it too personally when it happens to your spouse. We rarely choose these things, and, at least according to therapists, they’re bound to happen. In a sacred marriage, there’s so much more keeping us together than a momentary emotional storm. Remind yourself of those things: the vows you made to your Creator, to your spouse, before your church, and friends and family. The reality that you are married to your heavenly Father-in-Law’s daughter or son. Your kids’ welfare. Your witness. The spiritual benefit of working through difficulties in marriage instead of running from them. The fact that having to kill your marriage and betray your life partner should make you miserable and ashamed rather than happy.
Like a champion boxer who anticipates his opponent’s uppercuts, recognize that monogamy will also involve taking a few hits. One hard punch doesn’t have to knock you out and shouldn’t knock you out. Practice wise self-defense and you can stay in the ring and finish the match.
Knowing that outside infatuation remains a possibility can actually serve marriages. Proust suggests that a little jealousy rescues relationships that have been “ruined by habit.” It’s natural to begin taking our spouse for granted. Occasionally doubling down on winning our spouse’s hearts back is a good practice if it’s not done out of desperation and fear. Rather than remembering to do this only when we suspect an outside attraction has already been built, we can anticipate it. Since I now know that this happens, I shouldn’t get too laissez faire in my marriage. Just because I take a break from wooing my wife doesn’t mean her emotions will take a break from being wooed.
Positively working to cherish your spouse (by taking the Cherish Challenge!) can keep your mind and heart so activated and attuned to your own marriage that outside emotional attractions are likely to become far less common. At least, that’s what has happened with me.
Cherish Challenge Week 7
- Read chapter 9 of Cherish, “Cherish Your Unique Spouse.”
- If you haven’t done the Relate assessment yet, do it now here. This survey will help you understand yourself, your spouse, and your couple dynamics in a clearer, more scientific way. Get 20% off the purchase of your Relate assessment by using the coupon code “Gary”.
- Spend a date night describing each other. Yes, you’ve heard it all before, but go over your histories, your personalities, what makes each of you you.
- Choose a favorite picture to post in a place where you’ll see it every day: on your desk, where you get dressed, etc. If you already have such a picture, be intentional about looking at it each day for the next week, thinking about your spouse and what he/she means to you.
- Please share your story with how this is helping your marriage on the Cherish Challenge page here.
Since I live in a sexless marriage (not by my choice), I have been dealing with this constantly for nearly 30 years. I quickly realized I have one and only one choice: avoid women as best I can, especially in a one-on-one context. Work, church, out in public, it didn’t matter. Avoid, avoid avoid.
As you can imagine, this is quite hard since 50% of the planet are women. Work is especially difficult. I had to say “no thank you” to assignments, promotions, etc. You can also imagine I could not give the real reason, so while I tried to always lay the blame on myself (“its me, not you”) that didn’t always work, so sometimes I had to “fake” being mean or obstinate or whatever, so sometimes feelings were hurt, to my regret. Church is also difficult, but I realized if I just kept quiet and never talk to anyone, its for the best, and people mostly see me as stand-offish and leave me alone.
Here’s whats weird: I also have learned I have to avoid MEN as well, particularly for friendship. Why? Because if you become friends with someone (especially at church), you might become good friends. Then close friends. And what do close friends do? Share difficulties, problems, etc. So if that happens, there’s bound to be a time I slip up and blurt out this issue, and either humiliate myself, or worse, humiliate my wife. Which, despite the fact that she has been gatekeeping sex for 30 years, leading to our sexless marriage (last 7 years, maybe 10 times – despite 3 rounds of counseling), I don’t want to hurt or humiliate her by exposing this secret.
Anyways, while I know the points you make, and understand them, some of us have to go to more lengthy (or desperate) lengths to just try and get thru life.
Of course none of this actually helps the longings and the loneliness in my heart.
John: Sorry to hear about your situation. I admire your faithfulness to your marriage.
Your wife is living in sin, pure and simple. She needs to be held accountable. I’m not saying to publicly humiliate her, but certainly following Matthew 8:15… is called for. Informing a few close friends, elders of the church, and her pastor is not out of line. Maybe some embarrassment will help her choose the right path.
Also, get her hormones checked at a doctor specializing in bioidentical Hormone Replacement Therapy/Life Extension medicine. There is more going on than hormones obviously, but if she had some libido, it would make it easier for her to choose to do the right thing.
I experienced this and out of it learned to be emotionally honest with God. The Psalmists lay bare before God their feelings of loneliness, discouragement and struggle, I could lay before God this attraction that would break the covenant of marriage that is meant to reflect God’s covenant loyalty to his people.
Doing so, I found peace. The feelings for the other woman did not quickly go away, but they didn’t grow into a “I’m missing out on my real life” sentiment.
As a single person, this is pretty much exactly how I deal with the occasional same-sex attraction. It happens extremely rarely compared to the number of times I’m attracted to the opposite sex, so rather than freaking out about it I just shrug my shoulders, don’t feed into it and move on. No need to make it a bigger deal than necessary.
Thank you for your openness and willingness to be vulnerable, Gary. I’ve been a Christian for 41 years and happily married for 43 years. (“Happily” does not cancel out “difficult,” “lots of work” or “downright hard” at times.) I’ve been blindsided twice, both times believing that I was “a strong enough Christian” therefore able to keep it from happening. Unfortunately, I didn’t handle either case well. Over the years the closer I have grown to the Lord, the more I realize that yes, we are to be righteous (clothed in Jesus’ righteousness, not our own), but we also have to be real. Self-righteousness told me that I was strong enough in the Lord that something like this wouldn’t move me. Realism showed me something very different. I learned a much needed, but very hard, lesson! Out of these experiences was born the title for my blog: https://righteousrealism.wordpress.com. I believe we are setting ourselves up for trouble if we don’t face the reality of life. I agree with you that our feelings are not sinful. The reality? God gave us those feelings! He created us with them. But yes, what we do with them can be sinful.
Anon, allow me to comment on your remarks, please. You said, “To expect it to happen is tantamount to expecting oneself to sin in some or other way.” I consider myself a strong Christian, dedicated to pursuing holiness and perfection in and through Jesus Christ, but like Paul, “I have not yet obtained.” Until then, just as Paul, I sometimes do that thing I don’t want to, and sometimes don’t do that thing I want to. To me that is the reality part of my walk with Christ. I agree with you that “sin is sin.” You asked, “Why would anyone allow themselves to be put in a situation where they may feel attracted to another?” Both times that I was blindsided was precisely that, blindsided. I didn’t intentionally put myself in that situation. It took me totally off guard. To believe that it couldn’t was the very thing that got me in trouble.
I’d love to hear Lisa’s experience through these events. It seems that the person who was wronged is often overlooked, with all of the emphasis placed on a how a person ended up in this situation.
I have experienced this at least twice in my marriage on my part. (17 years next month) The first time I wasn’t aware it could happen either and it was early in our marriage. I shared it with my husband and it caused unneeded stress to us both.
The second time (more recently) I wasn’t anymore ready for it, and it was to a family member. I knew if I shared it with my husband it would make things very unnecessarily awkward for who knows how long. It seemed to last forever because of how often I would see him. I wouldn’t say I responded correctly (in my mind) during the entire process, but I prayed for it to go away many, many times. (My attraction was never made known to him in any way.) I shared it with a close friend. She prayed for me as well. Praise God it has passed. Our marriage is better than it ever has been. I pray I do not experience it 6 times.
Thank you for your willingness to write about this. I appreciate your vulnerability and the helpful practical steps you shared on overcoming this threat to long term marriage.
Gary, another fantastic post. Your perspective on this topic is super helpful, and I can say that based on my own past experiences similar to yours. Also, I totally agree with your response to Anon about Brother Lawrence’s classic. It can be dangerous to think “that shouldn’t or won’t ever happen to me.” We are all flawed, broken, and vulnerable to temptations we might not expect. Keep up the great work….you are so gifted on writing about marriages.
Gary, if you haven’t already, check out Judy Starr’s out of print book “enticement of the forbidden.” She and her husband were on a boat going island to island showing the Jesus video with Cru and she fell for the captain. It never got traction but is a needed message.
I’ve just listened to the letters of Brother Lawrence, “The Practice of the Presence of God” and thinking on what he wrote, I cannot conceive that it is natural and expected that we (as married couples) have to have been infatuated with someone other than our spouse at one or other time in our marriage or will eventually be infatuated by another for whatever reasons one explains to oneself. To expect it to happen is tantamount to expecting oneself to sin in some or other way. After almost 40 years of marriage, I have not been infatuated or flattered by anyone other than my spouse. Unfortunately, there is so much dysfunction in the Church and what the World considers normal is now considered normal in the Church as well. “It’s okay to be infatuated, just deal with it correctly” is not helpful. Sin is sin, and each of us needs to take a long, hard look at ourselves and choose to do the right thing in the face of all that is happening around us and to us. Why would anyone allow themselves to be put in a situation where they may feel attracted to another? In fact, this blog is over-generalizing, assuming that all people, Christian or not, will at some or other time feel infatuated by someone other than their spouse due to circumstance or feelings or flattery. Normalizing something like being infatuated by others is like giving permission to spouses to feel that way about a person other than their spouse – so long as they don’t entertain the thought further or act on their emotions. Oh, that God would be our all, constantly in our thoughts, leading us in all we do, see, say, think and hear.
Anon. I’ve read Brother Lawrence’s book at least 4 or 5 times and can’t conceive of anything he says that addresses this. I’m glad you’ve never experienced this and your testimony alone is proof not everyone will. where I disagree with you is that feelings are sinful. I believe what we do with our feelings may be sinful but not the feelings themselves
You’re correct, Gary. Brother Lawrence didn’t address this topic whatsoever. My understanding of what he says and what I took to heart is where it says:
“That we should establish ourselves in a sense of GOD’s Presence, by continually conversing with Him. That it was a shameful thing to quit His conversation, to think of trifles and fooleries…That he had always been governed by love, without selfish views; and that having resolved
to make the love of GOD the end of all his actions, he had found reasons to be well satisfied with his method. That he was pleased when he could take up a straw from the ground for the love of GOD, seeking Him only, and nothing else, not even His gifts.”
I apologize if I came across as condemning and self-righteous, please forgive me. When I read your blog, I was and am struggling to understand why this type of issue is such a stumbling block for many of us as Christians.
Gary, I really appreciate your thoughts in this article. Although I have never been married, I have experienced the other side: being infatuated by a married man, and being the object of infatuation by a married man (a different one). Both relationships were encased in secrecy; I now understand that any true relationship would never desire, much less require, secrecy.
But I would like to make another point, namely, we all must learn how to treat persons of the opposite sex as seeing them through God’s eyes. Are we not called to treat men as brothers, women as daughters/mothers, etc.? Recently I met an unmarried man at church, and my only thought was to engage him in conversation, so that I could find out what was beneath the veneer. I noticed that after a few minutes, he was able to look me in the eyes, which meant he was comfortable speaking with me. That is a pattern I would like to continue. After all, we should have many more friends besides our spouses!
Kathy, yes! A beautiful admonition. Thanks for sharing
As a Christian counselor, I have often taught what I call the “Three T Rule: Time, Talk and Touch.” I have since added a 4th T: Text. I am sometimes amazed at how often people will text others inappropriately these days. The 4 T Rule works both ways: decrease amount of involvement with those outside of your marriage. Increase the amount of involvement via the 4 T’s within your marriage. Thank you for this helpful article.
That’s worth an hours fee of counseling right there Richard! Thanks for sharing