11 People On When They Realized They Were Having An Emotional Affair

Emotional affairs always sound more loaded than just an affair. There’s something about the intimacy of being emotional with a person other than your spouse or partner and knowing that, deep down, it’s more than just some kind of physical attraction. All cheating is cheating, of course, but emotional affairs always feel trickier to work around. People hope they can be forgiven for having one; some couples work through them to stay together; others feel they are a worse betrayal than a one-night-stand — it really just varies. So, when it comes to people realizing that they are having an emotional affair, of course that’s just as muddy as discovering one.

The trouble with identifying that someone is having an emotional affair is that many people don’t think they’re doing anything wrong. Some may argue that a friendship is just a friendship, and others may try to cast blame on their partner or spouse. Psychology Today defines an emotional affair as having a deep connection to someone outside your marriage or partnership — someone you depend on for companionship and emotional intimacy, someone you have an emotional investment in.

But that doesn’t mean people always know they’re having one when they’re in the middle of it. These 11 people have shared, anonymously, the moment they realized they were having an emotional affair. For some, it was a subtle nudge. For others, it was a major whammy of a moment. And for a lot of them, well… they knew all along.

When did you realize you were having an emotional affair?

“I knew my husband wouldn’t like me talking to a friend the way I was, but I don’t think I thought of it as an emotional affair until I called the friend to share with him something hurtful my mom did and realized I thought of him before I thought about sharing it with my husband. That’s when I for sure knew.” — Julia, 35

“My best friend called me out. We were at a restaurant and ran into this guy we knew from high school. She assumed I hadn’t seen him in years like she hadn’t, but when he and I started talking as if we chatted all the time, she pulled me aside and asked me what was going on. That’s when I confessed that we’d been talking on Facebook for over a year and when she said, ‘How would you feel if your husband had this secret, too?’ I knew I couldn’t pretend like it was innocent anymore.” — Amy, 40

“I don’t know. I guess as soon as it started? I don’t feel like I would’ve had an emotional affair if things had been good at home, but that’s on me just as much as it is my husband.” — Rachel, 30

“At a neighborhood barbecue, a neighbor I was close with started talking to me about the golf game I’d had the weekend before with my dad and asking me how it went and if my dad did OK with his new wedge and all this super specific stuff. After she walked off, my wife looked at me more hurt than I’d ever seen her. It was clear I’d been talking to my female neighbor in a more intimate way than I should have, and I think that moment was when I really had to come to terms with how hurtful I’d been to my wife and our marriage.” — David, 39

“When I was more excited about going to work than coming home, I knew I’d gone too far.” — Danielle, 31

“I had a guy best friend from childhood. He and I talked all the time and were super close — we had never hooked up or anything, and he was my ‘man of honor’ and I was his ‘groomsmaid’ at each other’s weddings. We never even worried about our spouses having an issue because we just didn’t feel like being as close as we were was wrong. But eventually, my husband started getting irritated if he came home from work and my best friend was having a beer with me on the deck. Or if he called to talk to me when we were getting ready in the mornings. So we started sneaking around to talk, and I don’t know if that ‘forbidden’ part of it is what made it happen, but we started realizing we were having some serious feelings for each other. I blame some of it on my husband making things hard for our marriage at home, but I had to come to terms that maybe my best friend had always been an emotional affair and in the wings as a ‘backup.’” — Melissa, 35

“I don’t know if there were ever ‘signs’ I was having an emotional affair except for the obvious one: I was having an affair. When you’re reaching out to another person in an intimate way — and you know your partner would feel uncomfortable about it — it’s an emotional affair. Unfortunately, knowing you’re having one doesn’t mean you’ll stop. It took a divorce and a whole lot of therapy before I could really cope with the mess I made.” — Mark, 41

“I knew immediately what I was doing was an ‘emotional affair.’ You know how Jim and Pam are? And like if Roy’s around, they’re totally different? That’s how it was for me and my coworker. If my boyfriend had seen the way I talked to my coworker, he would’ve broken up with me immediately. But having a friend tell me that is what really made me break it off.” — Jessica, 29

“I had a ‘work wife’ that my own wife joked about a lot. She was just that person I clicked with at work that made meetings bearable, and we had a standing coffee date on Wednesdays after our first meeting of the day. My wife loved her — they texted a lot, too — but then my coworker and I started texting after work hours and calling each other. It was when I was pulling into our driveway one day and feeling sad about hanging up the phone with her that I realized this had gone too far. I told my wife about it, and I was able to request working in a different department. I have no one to blame but myself for it, but it happened so fast — one day she was just this person I worked with, and the next day she was the first person I was calling on my way home from work. I still can’t believe it happened.” — Richard, 45

“I’d like to say I had a sudden realization that what I was doing was wrong, but it was much more gradual. I would convince myself that flirting was harmless, and then the next week I’d try and convince myself that telling my coworker my problems was better than burdening my boyfriend with my issues. Every few weeks I feel like I’d feel bad, but then I’d just excuse the behavior until the next time.” — Sarah, 37

“When I had to lie to my kids about who I was texting because I didn’t want them to tell their dad. That’s when I knew.” — Hannah, 51