Some additional questions came up on my forum concerning a past article I had written that took a more in-depth look at the Children of the Midlifer’s Issues. A more detailed explanation was needed, and I wrote one, edited for flow and continuity.
Would someone explain the parents and affair partner? I guess I do not understand why having an affair would help you to work through issues with either of your parents.
The first aspect you need to try and understand, is that the affair partner is a minor aspect within a major midlife crisis. The affair itself is a symptom of deeper emotional problems that already existed within the midlife spouse who is deep within the stage of replay. The more emphasis you place on the affair partner, the more emotional power you give them. They are nothing to you, so you address them as little as possible.
The more you speak out against the affair partner, while infatuation is strong, the more strongly the midlife spouse will cling to them, and reject you. Understand the affair partner is not your problem–they are the midlife spouse’s problem to deal with. The affair has nothing to do with you, and everything to do with the midlife spouse who has made this mistake
Replay is a time of emotional regression, and the midlife spouse emotionally regresses back to the point where their emotional growth was stunted to relive or replay their emotional life and development back forward from that point. The midlife spouse becomes different–the opposite of what you once knew, and as they have become different, they begin to subconsciously search for a partner who is just like them.
I explain this aspect in one of the articles about the ‘children of their issues.’ Parents tend to raise children to be just like them, and the grown child “takes on,” or adopts, the attitudes, the ways of being, thinking, and doing, that are just like the parents who raised them–but with this raising comes issues that were formed.
It is what they have always known–they may have changed some before the midlife crisis, but very few ever change, grow, and become emotionally enough to cause this time to become an emotional course adjustment instead of a hard transition/midlife crisis.
The first step downward into an affair is when opportunity is presented–a chance meeting of a stranger, someone they know at work, an opposite sex friend of theirs that they would NEVER have looked at like this before, or even the left behind spouse’s best friend can be used for this purpose.
The affair partner is someone who is just like the midlife spouse’s parent, or parents they have issues with. The affair partner is an emotional “mirror” just like the parents who raised him/her. In order to outgrow a wrong dynamic, that same dynamic has to be recreated for that purpose–to mature this into a right dynamic. Through this experience, they will learn to make the emotional break they should have made with their parents as young adults, but never did, because they did not become fully mature adults as they were meant to be–this is the purpose the affair partner serves. I have watched it happen numerous times. It is difficult to understand–and I make NO excuses for this aspect, I am just explaining, based on the knowledge I have, why it happens to all but a precious few of the midlife spouses.
The most painful issues that exist within a midlife spouse come from their childhood, their developmental growth has been stunted, and they cannot overcome/outgrow this by themselves. In addition, the left behind spouse NEVER “fits” the regressed emotional need that comes forth within the midlife spouse–because if it were that way, then ALL affairs would be what’s called “exit affairs” and NO marriage would ever survive this emotional trial.
It is apparent your husband’s paramour must be just like either his mom, or his dad in personality (also known as ‘ways of being, doing, and thinking’). Often as not, the midlife spouse will often mistake/confuse this recreated dynamic as a “soul mate” connection, or even “true luv”—when neither is true.
The affair is all about control, manipulation, emotional blackmail, and misplaced responsibility–all issues that were created back in childhood. I am sure his parents know what happened to him, but do not expect them to expose him, because if they did, they would have to take on board the additional responsibility for the past emotional damage they had caused in him.
Some midlife spouses go home to their parents, move back in, and actually do this with them. However, most of the time, their parents are so set in their ways, refusing to learn the lessons they had probably never learned, and so, the midlife spouse chooses someone much younger than his/her parents, more malleable, more easily controlled, and manipulated–never realizing they (the midlife spouse) are just as bad, if not worse, than the affair partner they choose.
The midlife spouse in an affair is using the affair partner to meet emotional needs, while the affair partner is using the midlife spouse to meet needs, or even for money, upkeep, etc. The inner child IS the one who begins and maintains the affair. Contrary to popular belief, sex is NOT the major reason for an affair of this kind, unless there is a sexual complication, addiction, or “fault” previously present within the midlife spouse.
Otherwise, the affair begins as all of them commonly do–an opportunity that leads into the building of an emotional connection. If the midlife spouse had all it their way, it would remain just that, emotional–why? Because in their minds, they are drawn to this person whose ways (personality) reminds them of their parent, or parents, and the midlife spouse is seeking the unconditional love they never had as a child. They want to be accepted just as they are, without reservation, without judgment…and this exact emotional “mirror” shown within the affair partner fits the emotional needs of the MLC spouse in this particular situation; at least for a time.
If an emotional aspect within the affair partner does not quite “fit”, the midlife spouse will “mask” it, bypass it, or even ignore it, because it is not important.
However, nothing lasts forever, and in time, as the midlife spouse begins to mature within their Self, beginning to outgrow this “need” they have allowed to drive them into this emotional connection, they begin seeking to get away from the affair. This relationship has outlived its usefulness, and within the mind of the midlife spouse, it is time to “move on”–but they do not know how they will do it with the least amount of mess, and drama.
Sex may, or may not be in play, but the other woman/other man who perceives a loss about to happen will usually introduce this aspect into the mix at seemingly the last minute–it is the temptation that 99.9% of all MLC spouses fall into, and completely shatter their vows, as physical adultery is committed. It does traumatize the inner child, because this act crosses a line the child never meant to be crossed, and it makes an already bad situation much worse, because confusion and anger begins.
The other woman/other man becomes desperate, as they not only take something that was exclusively meant for the left behind spouse, they also employ a number of dirty tactics (control, manipulation, and emotional blackmail) meant to try and “keep” the midlife spouse with them. The worst mistake an affair partner can ever make is falling into “true luv” with someone whom they never had the right to claim ownership on in the first place. However, the affair partner has just as many past issues, if not more issues than the midlife spouse they have connected with. Contrary to what anyone might think, the affair partner is not “better” than the left behind spouse–they are simply different in their ways, actions, and level of, or even lack of, emotional maturity they display.
The midlife spouse steps a very long way down when they allow themselves to become thus entangled with someone who is willing to leave their personal morality in the gutter when they engage in an illicit relationship with someone who is already married. This remains true whether the affair partner is already married or not. You cannot tell either one of them anything, nor convince them to leave each other alone, because this is not right–just like teenagers, they think they know it all, and no one else knows anything but them. In time, they will find out they are so very wrong.
Time is one of the aspects that lead into a breakdown of an affair. When infatuation dies down, the true “face” of the other woman/other man begins to show, as the midlife spouse finds themselves changing. At a right time, they begin to awaken to what they have done, part of the mess they have made, and they begin thinking of ways to end this without a lot of drama—but that never works and it becomes a huge mess to disentangle themselves from the affair partner.
Just as they would have done with their parents, the midlife spouse tries to let them down gently, then tries to turn so obnoxious so that the affair partner will end it, instead of them ending it, and try other things to get themselves out.
Basically the affair ends when the midlife spouse has no further “need” for it, and goes through a process of becoming strong enough to end it. Not long before it ends (IF the affair partner does not go ahead and end the affair), they set their sights toward home and the left behind spouse who may or may not accept them back.
If you know the midlife spouse’s history, and you know the affair partner–nine times out of ten, the affair partner IS known to both midlife spouse, and left behind spouse–then you would be able to view the close similarities between their behavior, and the midlife spouse’s parent or parents they have issues with.
When they are deep within the affair, still in the infatuation stage, there is not one thing you can do, except to allow it to run its course, while you walk your journey for yourself.
Do not say or do anything you will regret later, because the midlife spouse will not always remember the good things you do or say–but they WILL remember all of the bad things, as they do remember how they were treated while in the deepest depths of their emotional crisis/midlife crisis
Food for thought.
((HUGS))
