Seven Ways Opposite Sex Friendships Are A Threat To Marriage

Many people stumble into affairs that begin with simple opposite sex friendships. These friendships can be justified as innocent because there is a lack of sexual tension or attraction. Advice and outlook from the opposite sex can be enlightening and helpful.

Husbands and wives are so sure of their ability to honor their vows of sexual fidelity that they don’t recognize the dangers associated with opposite sex friendships. Here are seven cautionary points to consider in evaluating how these friendships may weaken and destroy a marriage.

1. Emotional intimacy can lead to physical intimacy. Sexual attraction may not surface until the level of emotional intimacy has progressed to deeper levels. As we come to know and admire someone, our feelings of closeness may mature into creating that spark of erotic interest that wasn’t there in the beginning. "His admiration triggered a response in me." Friendships can evolve into passion as well as the other way around.

A natural progression of intimacy is a desire to touch or physically draw close to your friend. Non-sexual hugs and touches lead to intimate touch until the relationships is consummated with sexual relations. Affairs often begin as slow but evolving friendships.

2. Vulnerability or openness to an affair can change with circumstances. What may be safe now may not be safe later when there is serious misunderstandings, conflict or pressures on you or your marriage. There are ups and downs to every relationship. During a down time, the comfort and acceptance of the special friend may appear in a different light. What was formerly inconceivable intrudes into one’s imagination.

3. Secrecy is disloyalty. If there is self-consciousness about not revealing the friendship or any conversations or meetings with your friend to your spouse, you have already crossed a line of disloyalty. Lies can destroy trust, the foundation of a marriage. If your spouse can keep something like this from you what else is there? Any secretive friendship can be labeled an emotional affair.

4. Comparisons weaken marriage. The perception of positive qualities in a friend might lead to feelings of deprivation within the marriage. Comparisons are inevitable. Our admiration and appreciation of our friend may lead to a subtle dissatisfaction with certain qualities in our spouse.

It is a false comparison. Spouses live in the real world where they have commitments and responsibilities. It isn't always possible to have "on demand" intimacy or attention.

Friendships are generally devoid of problems and differences to work out. Differences are real and exist between any couple. Confiding in a friend can be a substitute for working through problems.

When we take off our rose-colored glasses, we begin find fault or criticize behavior that we formerly overlooked as charming or mildly exasperating. This turns to feelings of dissatisfaction, deprivation and unhappiness. Cross-sex friendships don't have a future. Marriage does. Cross sex friendships don’t have problems to work out. Marriage does.

5. Marriage needs emotional intimacy. We have limited time and energy to spend on relationships. Emotional closeness and sharing in friendships takes away energy, ideas and closeness from the marriage. These needs are being met elsewhere.

The friendship represents an intrusion into the private world of the couple. Certain conversations are special, saved only for the partner. You can be disloyal with the heart, not only with the body. A married couple shared a privately defined view of the world that is meant for them and them only.

Sexuality is the whole being, the essence of who we are. Sharing special feelings, playfulness, dreams, joys, despair, hurts and trials is sharing our masculinity and femininity in ways that should be reserved for your partner and your partner alone. This "soul-matching" outside of marriage robs the possibilities of these magical moments of bonding from happening inside the marriage.

6. Sharing marriage problems or providing a listening ear is dangerous. Conversations about marital problems with an opposite sex friend is being disloyal and provides fertile ground for getting needed compassion, comfort and understanding from a friend. This is fertile ground for the beginning of an affair. The friendship provides a sharp contrast in understanding and is already an act of disloyalty. The friend has replaced your spouse as your true confidant and "insider" in your life.

As a friend, when you provide compassionate listening to a troubled spouse, you may awaken or create feelings in yourself or in your friend that go far beyond simple help. Be ready to avoid these types of conversations and refer your friend to clergy, mental health professionals, counselors, family members, and or a same sex friend for the advice or help he or she needs.

7. Opposite sex friendships can threaten a spouse’s sense of security. The power and attraction of the friendship makes the spouse feel inadequate and insecure. He or she might wonder, "What am I not doing or bringing to the marriage? What is wrong with me? Why does my partner have the freedom to speak with a friend in a way that doesn't happen between us?"

For the sake of the marriage, why take any risks with friendships that potentially could detract from marital trust and security? If you have no other reason, protecting your partner’s sense of security and well-being should be reason enough to curtail these kind of friendships.