Where Should We Begin? with Esther Perel - Esther Calling - I Crossed a Line I Never Thought I Would Cross

Episode Date: August 7, 2023

What happens when you transgress the one boundary you never thought you would? In this week's Esther Calling, Esther talks to a woman who began an emotional affair after 10 years with her partner. She has since found herself alone and devastated by her own actions, unable to forgive herself or move on from the pain that she caused. Esther Callings are a one time, 45-60 minute interventional phone call with Esther. They are edited for time, clarity, and anonymity. If you have a question you would like to talk through with Esther, send a voice memo to [e-mail]. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

How can I tell the person that I'm with that I always said I wouldn't have any fear, that I had enough fear, and then expect her to stay with me or forgive me if I can't even forgive myself? Do you have something that you have done for which you are stuck, that you can't come to terms with how you see yourself and how you acted? Where the gap between your self-image and your behavior feels irreconcilable. It sometimes is an affair for some people and other things for others. Metrolinks and Crosslinks are reminding everyone to be careful as Eglinton Crosstown LRT train testing is in progress. Please be alert, as trains can pass at any time on the tracks.

Remember to follow all traffic signals. Be careful along our tracks, and only make left turns where it's safe to do so. Be alert, be aware, and stay safe. the question is uh i had a fee while i was with my ex of 10 years and i guess i'm really stuck my question is how do I possibly forgive myself, accept and move on? It is four years on. How do I move on from all the what-ifs? What if I didn't have an affair, but we'd still be together?

How do I meet peace with the fact that my ex is with the person that I had the affair with? Oh, the plot tickens. Tell me more. Clarify it a little bit for me, please. So it was a mutual friend, all friends. And like any relationship, there's easy and hard times. The hard times was really, really hard. And this friend became my soundboard, became the person I spoke to.

And we just became closer and closer. This friend then became an emotional flirt, I guess, flirt friend. And over a couple of years, it just became more serious. I then left my ex and this friend that was interested and, you know, alluded to possibilities just disappeared. And it was just distance, no contact. And then suddenly she spent more time with my ex, befriended my ex more in this mutual friendship. And then they got together. And she told my ex more in this mutual friendship and then they got together and she told my ex the affair she's the person who revealed the affair yes and it's a hard one because we always

agreed i said to her that i wouldn't tell my ex because for me personally, telling someone would just cause devastation unless you want to stay together and work on it. And she agreed, but then she told her. Have you ever had a chance to speak with your ex about, yes, or? No. She controls the narrative. Yeah, she was not interested. My ex said that it would probably just cause her more hurt.

Okay. All right. So let me see if I have all the pieces. And tell me which is the one that you feel most stuck around, right? You're 10 years in a relationship. There is an affair primarily defined by you as an emotional affair, but it elicits in you the longing for a different relationship. You leave your partner.

You hope to establish yourself with the new person, but she disappears and she actually becomes the partner of your ex. So you have the story of what happened in your primary relationship. You have the fact that you have the affair. You have the fact that the relationship ended. You have the fact that you wonder what would be if it hadn't ended or if you hadn't had the affair and you have the fact that the affair ends up being revealed to your ex by your lover who became your ex's steady partner? Yes, that's correct. Which is the one that keeps you up the most at night?

Regrets. For? For having the affair. Okay. Because how can I tell the person that i'm with that i always said i wouldn't have any fear that i had in a fee and then expect her to stay with me or forgive me if i can't even forgive myself and what you can't forgive is the transgression, the lying, the betrayal, the attraction, the secrecy, the duplicity.

Which piece of it? Secrecy and the lying. Tell me more. The type of person I never thought I would be or could be. If I reflect on my life, I've always judged people for having an affair. How could they? So disgusting, you know. I would never.

And then I did. And when you were in it, how did you square it with yourself? I think it's more, and it's so hard to explain, I think it's more and it's so hard to explain I think it's more that I never thought I would leave her I really loved her and then I really loved this other person and even at one point I thought God in the open open relationship would be the solution to everything because I have one person that fulfills all these needs and then another that fulfills others. How did they divide? What was the division about?

Intimacy. My ex didn't really want to be intimate with me anymore and she didn't see me in an attractive light. And that was openly discussed? Before you wanted an open relationship, did you have an open conversation she said she found me less attractive because i often asked to be intimate she didn't find that attractive so there was always a reason for why it was lacking can i ask you something

of course do you have a feeling that your lover schemed all along a few people have asked me that question ok I'm not original I don't think so I honestly don't think so because what that would mean in my mind that would mean

she's a terrible person regardless of it all I think they're both really good people. Good. So the big hook is when you keep saying you're a bad person. How could you do such a thing? This is beyond repair. Forever you need to live with the stain and you are no longer a person redeemable

and permitted to have a future? I guess in my mind, if it was forgivable, then wouldn't the ex forgive me and we'd still be friends? She forgave the person, the other person, but she can't talk to me, I guess. But is it she who has to forgive you, or is it you who can't live with yourself and reconcile these opposing parts?

It's mostly me. Okay. What would forgiveness look like, or what would responsibility look like? What would it take to turn shame into guilt i feel guilty i feel shameful i think i feel everything forgiveness would probably look like that i don't think about it so much that it comes up all the time but a lot of people are like it's four years move on um are you able to compassionately understand why you crossed a line that you never thought you could cross

i think that that is one of the questions that a lot of people who have transgressions are faced with, especially when before that they think, this would never be me, I could never do such a thing. But then when they do it, the question is, what propelled them? It's not like this was a regular habit. There was something, and it's often a confluence of a few things, that made it happen then and there, that helps them understand where they were at then. Because you judge yourself with where you are at today. So even when you say, I felt rejected, my partner didn't want to be intimate with me, she pegged me as needy. She was pushing

me away. And you just kind of factually recount it. I don't know if that's the only thing, but that is often one of the things that people carry with them. And sometimes they even rationalize and justify it. It can't hurt them since they don't want me anyway. Did you ever ask yourself, what pushed me to cross a line that I never thought I would cross, where I would find myself in a situation where my values clashed with my behaviors? I did. I've had a lot of reflection um I guess we had very different attachment styles of how we deal with conflict my way of dealing with conflict was to talk it through immediately to fix things versus her way of dealing with things was taking space that could be an hour a day.

So that was really hard. And all she knows, I never gave her the space because the more she took time, the more stressed and anxious I felt. So her way of pushing me away even further was to say things, and perhaps not very kind things. Meaning? You know, I don't want to be with you, or I find you unattractive. And to me, and how I grew up, words mean more than actions.

So if you said to me, I think you're ugly, that would probably stay stuck in my head forever even if you just you know if you were angry um so more and more the words just I guess accumulated in my head and I think in some ways when I had the fear I was like well I want to hurt you back as much as you're hurting me even though i didn't want to find out it's so strange no because once she would find out you would lose the power of the sting but when you have another person when you have a third person entering the system, the anxiety goes away. The power of her hurt diminishes because you have another person who is appreciating you, desiring you, approving of you, admiring of you, adoring you, wanting your company all the time. And so it offsets the refusals and the rejections

and the coldness and the distance and the anxiety that follows about her distance. All of that gets suddenly taken care of, so to speak. That is very correct. It's not about telling her or not telling her. It's the fact that you can soothe yourself. You can diminish the hurt. You can weaken her power over you. You can close the gap that you feel when she takes distance and she takes space because that's the way she resolves things or at least calms herself. I think that when you try to understand why you did certain things, it's always important to know the meaning of the affair. What did it come to do? Why did it exist? What was its function in the relationship? It wasn't just I found somebody who desired me and I loved that after I had been so rejected.

It's I found someone who basically was like an intervention on all the cracks in my relationship. There were a lot of cracks. I mean, I think it's mostly how we functioned how we thought i did feel inferior in many ways you know i loved her job loved hearing about a job just so passionate she got bored when i talked about my job you know so reflecting on what you're saying there's just lots of little things that probably became one, you know, big ball of things. And you are not somebody who would have left.

No, no. But in fact, you were trying to leave. Not that you were trying to leave the relationship per se, but you were trying to leave the structure of the relationship and where that put you. And a third, a lover often helps us offset the structure of our relationship, of our primary relationship. And when you think I messed up, I messed my life, I lost my partner, here I am. I'm constantly berating myself.

I think it's important for you that the part of you that couldn't leave because you are too anxious to make that decision. And instead of saying, I don't want you, you find yourself always in the position of why don't you want me? These two parts were already in conversation back then. Yes. And then what happened? You actually did leave? Or how did you dismantle the knot? The first year, I guess it was just secret texting. My ex knew we were friends, but not the extent to which we were talking,

which was pretty much nonstop. And then the second year became this flirtatious emotional affair via text. And about a month before I broke up with her, I got physical, bit of fool around, but regardless at that point, I was already in a fear. And I just couldn't live with myself. I think if that didn't happen, I would have stayed and continued having this emotional fear. This person I had in a fear with just kept saying I'd never leave my ex. I felt at that point I created the situation where I was stuck. I loved my ex, didn't want to leave her consciously in my mind,

even though I was having an affair. And then I had this friend that I had an affair with that I didn't want to think I was using her because in my mind I wasn't using her. Can I ask you something? What is an emotional affair for you? An emotional affair to me is talking to someone else more than my partner about our problems, that I yearn more to hear how someone else's day was then i am interested in my partner's comings and goings to me an emotional fear is when i shift more of my heart to someone else

and that was because you found a better listener because you found someone who was more interested in you because she was not bored with your job because? I found my ex the way she was 10 years ago in this friend. At the start of our relationship, my ex was super interested in everything I had to say, so much patience and love. Then it kind of disappeared. But then this person was everything she used to be. And did that make you go home and say, I want more between us?

Or did that make you say, well, I don't have it at home, but at least I found it? The second one. Which I think is part of the big regrets I'm struggling with because I keep going what if I wasn't on my phone 24 7 to this other person maybe we still would have broken up but maybe we would still be friends maybe we wouldn't have been but it's like I muddied the waters by having an affair do you feel like

before you can forgive yourself you need to punish yourself you need to pay your dues you need to make amends what do you feel is needed for you to say I think I messed up but it didn't come out of nowhere either. And no, it's not the way

I imagined the denouement would take place. And I feel very bad, but there's parts of me that actually do wonder how would this thing have continued between me and the lover and between me and my partner. In a way, you left because you felt that you didn't feel like you could be honest. And the only honesty that you had was to keep the secret and go away with the secret. And then you got betrayed by your lover and so the target keeps moving and you feel like i left my partner for you and then you left me for my partner and then you even took the story with you and now you own the story too on top of it i don't know what the answer is do you you don't have to have the answer do Do you have that as a question? Does that doubt exist with you? Okay.

Yep. Okay. Because you're not going to have straightforward answers, but you may need to introduce some doubts rather than these very stark statements that you make to yourself all the time. What you will learn is how to continue to feel somewhat guilty and some responsibility over your own actions in the relationship, not over what your partner didn't

do. You created the relationship together. One person had an affair, but two people created the relationship. And it will coexist with, and then life continued. And I met other people, and I built something new, and I kept very close in mind what I needed to be careful of. And we live with license, with regret, with guilt, and with permission. They live side by side. And at some point, you can write a letter. Have you ever written a letter to your ex?

Many. Many. And does she ever answer? When I say write a letter,'ve written a million letters without sending it. Without sending them. So you may want to one day write one but you're not going to go and what you would like is for her to be

your friend so that she can absolve you and maybe this is not about absolutions. Maybe this is about living with the responsibility of your actions without crucifying yourself because of it. That would be good. You understand?

You have things that you regret having done, but that doesn't mean you don't have the permission to breathe anymore. Or to enjoy, or to laugh, or to fall in love, or to be loved. That makes sense. We carry all kinds of things in our suitcases. So it's not about making light of this. It's about understanding it and it's about owning the messiness of it,

living with the consequences of your actions, having regrets for some pieces of it, but not the whole story. And then taking that along as part of the things that you want to really be aware of, closely attentive to, as you continue your life with other people. over the last four years i've consciously you know know, reflected on. What do I want of another relationship? But more, what do I want out of me? I think that was a big part of, I don't even know what made me happy.

So I guess there's lots of positives out of. Give me a few. What are some of the ones that you came up with good boundaries like someone else is not there to complete me if they unhappy it doesn't mean i'm unhappy if they happy it doesn't mean i'm happy because that's how i've always lived as long as i can make someone else happy then i'm happy my partners need to compliment me not completely you know um have you met people and have you met potential partners and sabotaged it in the last four years yes as in you don't know who you're dealing with i'm a mess i don't deserve this I destroy things on my way yes I'm destroying things on my way

do you carry a sign around your neck no I just tell them you know and then I get scared when people get too close and I push them away you get scared that? You know, I might get into another situation of caring so much about someone. Okay, but that has nothing to do with cheating. No. You understand? You've got to separate the pieces a little bit.

Your fear that when you get attached to someone, you lose yourself. They become the marker of everything. And when they bestow all their attention on you, you're in heaven and you're in bliss and all goes great. But when they start to not do so, or when they start to react to your demand for this kind of attention, as your ex seems to have done, then you go restless, you feel anxious, you don't know who you are when they are not shining a light on you. That's the piece that needs to mature and that wants to be examined.

Because that's the piece that determines more who you have been in your relationships rather than how you have reacted when you didn't like who you were in the relationship. You've put all the focus on the affair and the cheating, which is important, but it was in big part a reaction. It was trying to undo something that you were experiencing. It was a response to something. And that something is what you describe as, I'm afraid that if I get attached in a certain way, I lose my boundaries.

And so now in your next relationships, it's about that. Absolutely. You've put all your attention on the way you cheated and you didn't put enough of your attention on the way you loved or sought love. I know. Am I saying anything new or am i reinforcing things you somewhat know but don't really like to no you're reinforcing i mean like i said the last four years have been i've changed

more as a person for the better and in terms of understanding myself and what I want in my entire life of 44 years but then I'm always like trapped back into that's great but it came at a massive loss yes I got involved in attending to my wounds rather than attending to the way that I had adapted to the wounds of my childhood. And now I know that my focus really needs to be on my own attachment style, on my own ways of loving, on my own ways of being in an intimate relationship with a partner. Because in some way, if I keep focusing only on the affairs, I'm missing a big piece of my own story. I understand. Thank you. I want to leave you with that.

Because you spent four years very diligently thinking about a lot of things. And I think that a piece of what you're asking me in terms of how you get unstuck and how you allow yourself to move on is not about forgiving yourself for the affair only. That may be a piece of it, but it is more so how do I know that I can love differently from the way that I loved then that led me to the very affair that I then had because I just couldn't tolerate the consequences of my relationship.

That's all very good advice. Thank you very much, Esther. Thank you so much. Thanks for taking the time. This was an Esther calling. A one-time intervention phone call recorded remotely from two points somewhere in the world. If you have a question you'd like to explore with Esther, it could be answered in a 40 or 50-minute phone call.

Send her a voice message, and Esther might just call you. Send your question to producer at estherperel.com. Where Should We Begin with Esther Perel is produced by Magnificent Noise. We're part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. In partnership with New York Magazine and The Cut. Our production staff includes Eric Newsom, Eva Walchover, Destry Sibley, Hyweta Gatana, Sabrina Farhi,

Eleanor Kagan, Kristen Muller, and Julian Hatt. Original music and additional production by Paul Schneider. And the executive producers of Where Should We Begin are Esther Perel and Jesse Baker. We'd also like to thank Courtney Hamilton, Mary Alice Miller, Jen Marler, and Jack Saul.