On Married Men
On Married Men: “The music teacher is sad after receiving an email this afternoon from the man she met yesterday. He feels guilty and is deleting his profile from the dating site, and returning to work on his marriage. This is the fourth such experience with a married man she’s had.
It’s probably just as well. She was in serious danger of falling in love with this man so perhaps it is all for the best. But she will grieve in the meantime, and she has decided to have no more ‘discreet encounters’ with married men. It is too painful to open her heart and have it shut down so abruptly so often.
I can hear the moralists now saying she had no right to be involved with married men in the first place, and once upon a time she would have agreed with them but she’s learned that the issues and reality of these situations are infinitely more complex than that.
The vast majority of the men she has met on dating sites are married and seeking sexual relationships because their wives are either not interested in sex at all or are rarely interested in sex. People are often scathing or derisive of men’s sexual needs and take the attitude they should just get over it or masturbate but that’s a fairly callous and simplistic viewpoint.
Most of these men want intimate contact – touching, cuddling, stroking, and affection. They want to be desired and wanted for all of who they are, which includes their sexuality. Most of them are denied any intimate contact because their wives fear it might lead to sex.
While it is every woman’s right to refuse sex if she doesn’t feel like it, does she have the right to expect exclusivity or celibacy from her mate if that is the case? He didn’t take a vow of celibacy. Many people believe the vow of celibacy in the Catholic priesthood is wrong or at least unrealistic but yet they expect married men whose wives are not interested in sex to be celibate and effectively denied a basic and often profound need for connection.
The men the music teacher has met are genuinely in love with their wives and have no interest in breaking up their families. They just need sex and would prefer to have it with their wives if they were willing. In many ways, women like the music teacher are keeping these relationships together because they satisfy some of the needs these men have so they can function in their daily lives and with their families. But the reality is they are torn apart by the guilt from such encounters and are placed in the dilemma of living a double life. For men of integrity, as many of these men are, it is too heavy a burden to bear.
In the past mistresses and affairs were tolerated, sometimes openly, sometimes not, as a solution to mismatched libidos and the boredom or stagnation of over familiarity within a marriage. I expect many women found it a relief to know that their husband’s needs were being met elsewhere. But it seems in our culture the idea is an anathema as society propounds the notion that to be pure love needs to be exclusive and finite, which is far from the truth. Love for one person does not exclude the possibility of an equal love for another, and the capacity for love is infinite with freedom and self-awareness.
Perhaps it is time to examine some of the beliefs that surround monogamy and marriage. There are too many should’s, and expectations that are causing deep damage to those on whom they are imposed. There needs to be some rational loving thought applied to this issue.
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