As the Patraeus affair remains newsworthy, at least, to the moronic media, we, here, at our house have barely mentioned it.  We don’t watch much broadcast news, here, at home, although Husband gets more than plenty since he is in the biz. His favorite soundbite so far is when The Talk’s Sarah Gilbert remarked,

“It’s unsettling that the head of the CIA couldn’t keep it secret.”

Go Sarah!

I liked Elle at Betrayed Wives’ Club’s  editorial.  She questioned Patraeus’ statement that he

“deeply regrets and knows how much pain this has caused his family.”

I agree with her that he probably doesn’t know the half of it, at least, not yet.  Men are such different critters than women are.  Many men knee-jerk their way through discovery of their affair with remarks like

“It was very brief.”

and

“It didn’t mean anything.”

Let’s all say it together:

“It means something to ME!”

Well done.

This seems to confuse some men, at least a little bit, that we women are so shaken, which explains why some of them are so anxious for us to forget it and “move on.” They just want to get back to the way things were, before the discovery.  I experienced that, myself, but I was clearly trying to avoid the journey through the pain.  Perhaps that’s it with men.  They want to avoid a journey through their wives’ pain?

Well, heck…who wouldn’t?

It’s not fun watching someone suffer and it’s not fun being accountable for the suffering.  If only men could do this math before they took advantage of the opportunity to get it on the side.  This would involve thinking beyond their immediate urge.  Do I mean to say that affairs are the result of a definite lack of planning?

You bet I do.

Studies show that the greatest obstacle to affairs is opportunity.  Yes, I’m disappointed, too.  Here we invest all of this emotion and time into this relationship to learn that, in most cases, if the study is correct, the thing keeping a man from straying is a ****ed lack of opportunity.  Seriously?

What does his mean?  It means that we can assume things are on course, but that does not mean the train won’t jump the track, anyway.  The control we have turns out to be preparation.  Not only can we never take our love for granted, but we have to be real with one another about the temptations which are out there.

My friend, Jeannie, who’s has worked with married couples for years tells me that many Other Women only pursue married men.  Jeannie’s husband is a cop and tells her of the propositions he gets and how he sees others around him take advantage….apparently, the thing about men in uniform is no myth.

The late Peggy Vaughan and her husband, James’ book, Beyond Affairs, was an education for us as we passed the book back and forth and read passages to one another.  My husband’s bewilderment over his own behavior is a testament to the fact that sometimes not a lot is going on, upstairs, when the moves are being put on them.  Sure, it took a couple of months, but the OW wore my husband down.  My husband didn’t move out of her way and let himself be distracted by her again and again until he lost his focus.  Did he know better? Of course!  The fact is the OW came on to him multiple times and he finally surrendered his imagination to her.  It didn’t become physical for a number of weeks due to distance, although she called him to tell him she would be in town thus and such a weekend and wished to “make herself available” to him, early on, which he declined.  That is, until he didn’t.

Something happens between fidelity and infidelity and my opinion is that it’s about honest communication. Secret-keeping is the affair culture’s best friend.