Emotional “Cheating” – Harmless or Not?
May 9, 2018
MARICAR:
Years ago, I had a boyfriend and our relationship was having problems. Then a common friend introduced me to Steve (not his real name) at a party. I enjoyed talking to Steve that night, relieved to be away from the problems I had with my boyfriend.
Days after, we exchanged some “harmless” messages: “Stuck in traffic! What u doing?”, “Hey I just passed by your school!” , “Know any good restos in QC?” , “Bored! ‘Musta???”
I didn’t want to admit it back then, but Steve’s messages weren’t ordinary to me. May konting kilig, so I felt guilty. I’d make myself feel better by thinking, “I’m not doing anything wrong. Steve is just a friend.”
I kept my “harmless” chats with Steve from my boyfriend. I didn’t want to fight over “nothing.” Again, I told myself “Steve is just a friend…” Or a worse excuse: “I’m just getting a guy’s perspective on my relationship problems…”
Talking to Steve didn’t help my relationship AT ALL. I looked forward to Steve’s messages more than my boyfriend’s. I was becoming emotionally tangled with Steve. Looking back, this wasn’t as harmless as I thought.
Would I be OK, if my boyfriend was exchanging messages with a girl that he had some “kilig” for? It’s absolutely NOT OK. I would feel uncomfortable, or even betrayed. So it was unfair of me to do it to him.
Today, stories like mine remind Richard and I of how vulnerable we are to feel-good emotions like kilig. It pushed us to make excuses for what we won’t admit in our hearts to be wrong or unfair —all in the name of “love.”
Our mentors told us to do our best to guard each other against increasing levels of emotional attachment to another person, especially in a committed relationship.
It feels uneasy, but Richard and I tell each other in detail who we are attracted to. Admitting the truth makes the kilig emotions less powerful. Hiding it from each other makes them stronger! (Secrets —> more mystery —> more kilig!)
We also help each other keep our distance, and make sure we don’t have long conversations alone with the “attractive” person. Richard and I realize that fighting for our relationship is a team effort!
As our mentors say, “People don’t start out planning to cheat. Laging hindi ‘yan sinasadya. But it usually starts with a harmless message…”
May we learn to guard our committed relationships well, everyday! Take heart!
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Posted by , May 9, 2018
14 thoughts on “Emotional “Cheating” – Harmless or Not?”
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Indeed! Its cheating even exchanging uncommon txt messages..if someone is not really happy in their current relationship,please leave.. Don’t dare hurt someone’s feelings esp. If its really pure love .. Its really rare to find.. ?
This is so true!
Very true! thats exactly what happened to my 18yrs (with 3 kids) relationship…???
I can totally relate to this. I am happily married and my husband and I had a LDR ( me in US and husband in Phils), out of the blue an ex, who’s also in US suddenly became a chatmate and I looked forward to the ex’s messages more than my husband’s. I soon realized that it was unfair to my husband and cut the communication to the ex shortly after. When you are in a relationship, you commit to each other and fight for each other not with each other.
Thanks for this good topic po. ? I have read an e-book titled emotional purity dealing wih the same topic. And yes, we should guard our committed relationships well by guarding our emotions. ❤
I like this article so much! Something to share to my Fiancé. Eye opener I should say. God bless.
So much relate. Thank you for keeping us inspired.?
So much relate. Thank you for keeping us inspired.?
OMG! Very timely. Hahaha. My boyfriend just did this a couple of days and I caught him red handed yesterday. At first he kept on denying it kasi he was just talking to them DAW and ask for pieces of advice why are girls like this and that. And to mention that it was just 4 days DAW na he’s talking with this girl, and hindi naman DAW sila nagkikita. I was explaining it to him that it was a form of cheating kasi their messages to each other has a bit of kilig na. Ayoko man aminin pero it was so nakakasakit kahit papaano.
I’m a guy and before I had a really possesive girlfriend.. to the point I was thinking I might be gay because all the numbers in my phone was only my family and my male friends. Unfortunately due to cheating we broke up. Eventually I went into another relationship this time we were both open with people we like, she even had a crush on one of my friends and I told her “yeah I think he’s handsome too” and she also had a friend that I liked. I guess what I’m trying to point out is, I loved how mature she was and how open she was to the fact that we can be attracted to other people or lets just say BEAUTY but thats just about it, I’m not thinking of getting into any sort of relationship with any of them I’m enjoying my less complicated life and I can’t jeopardize that . Now I have lots of friends that are girls and they usually talk to me about anything and I would tell my girl about it and she also gives her opinion.
I might commit a few grammar mistakes here sorry about that –
oh and she’s my wife now and I still have female friends and they became her friends too. I guess its nice if everybody just gets along. There are some that would try to get in the way but i’ll answer it next time since i’m at work today.
This is so true. It happened to me, I think 9yrs ago with my ex-husband. He has a constant lunch out “girl” friend during that time, who happened to be also his constant textmate. And now they are in their 9th year being together haha. Well, i regreted that I didnt call his attention about it. Now i learned my lesson, trust nobody.
been here, done that.. it’s hard but i found a way to untangle myself. ?
This topic “Emotional Cheating” is really my favorite Ms. Maricar and looking forward to more similar of that kind of topic ma’am. Altho some of your readers are not yet married but we enjoy reading your blog. More blogs to post it online ma’am and God bless.
Sad but it happens