SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

When it comes right down to it, it all is brain chemistry. The question of why an individual has the specific brain chemistry is the one we don't always have the answer to.

A couple of years ago I was at a conference, specifically regarding addiction. They have discovered that a lot of things that were thought to be "decisional" were actually not decisional on the part of the person affected by addiction.

The person who is addicted thinks that they are making decisions, and the people around them think they are making decisions, and, under observation, it superficially looks like they are making decisions, but when you start isolating out their behaviors, you find that they are acting out behavior patterns that they are completely unaware of.

In the end, they do make a decision, such as to buy a bottle of wine, or methamphetamine, or something that they are addicted to, perhaps it is to cheat on their spouse with yet another person. However, they get to that final decision point with a lot of very subconscious behavior patterns that lead them to that decision point.

Part of the treatment of addiction, whether it be sexual, or otherwise, is to recognize these behavior patterns and interrupt them. This may be one of the reasons that going to Alcoholics Anonymous or Narcotics Anonymous helps some people. Changing behavior patterns is very hard. In the absence of self awareness, we tend to continue doing things that we have done before, regardless of the consequences. Frequently, that is because we don't actually recognize the consequences as being linked to our behavior patterns.

The science on this is still evolving.

My FWS was reading a book about adult children of alcoholics approximately 10 to 12 years ago, during early years of reconciliation. Her father is an alcoholic, it left her somewhat shellshocked. She said she felt like someone had followed her around and written a book about her life.

She wasn't even aware that she was repeating a cycle over, and over, and over, and had been doing so for long before she met me. After she met me, she still repeated the same cycle, but it was much slower being spread out over of a much longer period of time.

In some cases it's not just how good the affair feels, but how it reduces how the WS feels about the BS long term by comparison

[This message edited by survrus at 6:43 PM, Wednesday, March 27th]

In some cases it's not just how good the affair feels, but how it reduces how the WS feels about the BS long term by comparison

Can you expand on this thought?

I can’t speak to what survus had in mind, but I can share this.

In recovery, we came to use the term vilification to describe how my spouse’s ‘addiction’ to the high of the affair impacted his view of me.

In essence, it is a defense mechanism. On some levels, he knew he was violating his own values, so to justify it and defend from his sense of shame, he began to increasingly build up a distorted view of me.

He displaced anger at himself on me. I was the villain who had rejected him, and that rejection is why he needed her.

I felt this vilification long before I knew about the affair, and after discovery, the anger that had come to dominate our relationship slipped away because he started to have to confront his own shame and challenge his distorted view of me.

Now, he feels a lot of disgust and shame about her, but we are working on that because that’s just another form of displacement.

Thisissofine’s post confirms my understanding of the neurobiology involved, a neurochemical cocktail, including dopamine and PEA amongst others, that contribute to the high of an affair. Oxytocin is a social bonding hormone, I.e. helps in mate and parental bonding and this is the first I’ve ever read that it’s a cause for addiction in this way, Part of the mix, the cocktail, is surely many psychological factors, including the ego boost and stroking, the excitement and escapism and fantasy mittyesqueness and the sense of a renewal of the possibilities and carefreeness of youth to name but a few, so it seems highly reductive reasoning by the therapist; the oxytocin can as easily be supplied in mate bonding between bs and ws, so it doesn’t make sense to reduce it to one hormone - at least to me.

[This message edited by Edie at 3:42 PM, Saturday, April 6th]

In some cases it's not just how good the affair feels, but how it reduces how the WS feels about the BS long term by comparison

I am certain that is true for some ws, and that is part of seeking out additional affairs.

It was the opposite for me. I would compare the aftermath of the affair to be more like a near death experience. Meaning, given the extended chance to be married instilled a fierce level of appreciation. To do things right. To honor and cherish and all the things that I don’t think I had deep understanding of prior.

I would definitely say with nearly losing him and our family as we know it was a sobering and humbling experience. I do not feel less towards my husband, I feel more. And I don’t feel that wholesome feeling is overshadowed by the squalor and madness of an affair. The contrast is very clear to me.

But I don’t disagree that for some what survus is saying is true or we wouldn’t have repeat offenders.