Being Out of Touch With Your Emotions and the Risk for Infidelity

Just this week I was watching an online interview with an unfaithful spouse who was explaining how he ended up having an affair. "I didn't realize how I was feeling (in the marriage)," he explained. And this lightbulb went off for me: I've heard this sentiment so many times before, from many clients in affairs, and even from my own spouse after I discovered his affair.

There is a huge RISK for infidelity in self-disconnection, and lack of attunement to your own feelings. Maybe you grew up in a family that didn't talk about feelings. Maybe you learned early to bury discomfort. Maybe emotions scare you. Whatever the reason, being blind or shut off to our own emotional reality and experience in real time is a scary thing when it comes to our marriages.

So when an unfaithful spouse says "I didn't know how I was feeling until (crisis of affair)," here's the problem with that... It calls the emotional reality of the unfaithful spouse into question, big time. How does a betrayed spouse know what's true, and what's fabricated in hindsight? They wonder: Are you lying to me, or are you lying to yourself? Did your justifications for what you were doing create a new reality in which you were less happy than you actually were?

An affair has a way of turning everything inside out. It's so hard to tell what's true, what's real, and what's created either by the affair itself, or by the person having the affair. It's a messy autopsy that rarely leads to clean conclusions.

But what I know as an affair specialist is this: a person who isn't self-aware, who isn't in touch with their feelings, and who isn't in touch enough to express them in real time within the relationship, is at huge risk for infidelity.

When someone is out of touch with their emotions, it's not that they're not feeling anything... it's that they aren't even aware of how they feel. Even further of a risk, they can't recognize how their feelings connect to problems that need to be addressed or resolved. So instead, the feelings get buried, redirected, or acted out in other ways. And that's exactly how people end up in situations they never intended -- like an affair.

When you aren't in tune with your own sadness, loneliness, resentment, or unmet needs, you can't voice them. And, this lack of self-connection is also highly correlated with a lack of ability to vocalize, since you can't say what you don't yourself understand.

When the affair creeps in, there's a relief in that connection without even taking the time to realize what you're doing. All of a sudden, all you know is that you're feeling the good stuff again, like connection, validation, comfort, or excitement.

So if you had an affair, were you telling yourself before the affair that things were "fine," or "not that bad"? And here's the thing -- maybe they were fine, and they weren't that bad, but the affair shone a spotlight on something new and clean, making your marriage look dingy and pale in comparison.

But, if the truth is that your experience in the marriage was always a result of you staying quiet and self-disconnected, well, the good news my friend is that you have some worthy work to do. Read on:

What To Do About It

1. GET UNSTUCK: Uncover the REAL Reasons for Your Affair is designed to guide you through the questions of why you had your affair. I took the most powerful, important, and impactful questions I ask my private clients and put them in one mighty e-book for you, at a fraction of the cost. Click the link above to start your journey of self-reflection now.  
   

2.  Name what you feel: Stop disconnecting and start slowing down and letting what's happening inside of your body translate to the words out of your mouth. Set a timer once a day and ask yourself, What am I feeling right now? Don’t settle for “fine” or “stressed.” Go deeper. Are you lonely? Jealous? Overwhelmed? Relieved? Naming your emotions helps you regulate them instead of outsourcing that regulation to something (or someone) else.
   

3. Notice what triggers you: Pay attention to the moments you get reactive or shut down. Those moments are clues. They tell you where old wounds, unmet needs, or deeper fears might be hiding. Instead of judging your reaction, get curious: Ask yourself, "What emotion is underneath this?" 
   

4. Practice emotional honesty in your relationships: Tell the truth about what you feel, not just what you think. Saying, “I feel disconnected from you and I don’t know how to fix it,” or "I'm really hurting and I'm at a loss right now" is far more vulnerable and healing than blaming or withdrawing. Emotional honesty builds real intimacy, and it's worth the risk it feels like.  

   
   

Emotional awareness doesn’t just prevent infidelity; it changes how you show up in every area of your life. When you can name and tend to what you feel, you harness the power of true connection -- to yourself, and to others.

If you need help because of an affair, we're here for you -- it's what we do. You can explore self-help resources that are expertly designed to help unfaithful spouses, affair partners, and betrayed spouses move forward, one of our private membership communities, or schedule a confidential session.

Lauren LaRusso, LPC, LMHC | Founder