AS I SEE IT
BY MARIANNE HERON
There they were, hiding in plain sight. Normally illicit romance is clandestine, with trysts in anonymous hotel rooms hidden from the public gaze. But Andrew Byron and Kirsten Cabot seemed like any other couple canoodling on a date at a Coldplay concert at a stadium just outside Boston. Until they weren’t.
Their liaison, perhaps innocent not dangereux, came to light far from the usual nudge-and-wink of being spotted together with the wrong partner. It went viral, initially caught on the all-seeing eye of the Kiss Cam. There they were on screen together, as thousands watching expected them to play the game and embrace. Instead, Byron ducked out of sight, the incident was caught on phone video and posted on social media.
Whatever was going on it looked bad, as both parties are married to others and even worse when Byron happened to be the CEO of a company and his squeeze was his HR manager. The fallout from being caught on camera continues. Byron has resigned from his position as CEO at the AI company Astronomer and Cabot is on leave.
The story begs the question why do people cheat? Why, given the betrayal, the hurt to families, the threat to jobs and futures, put everything at risk?
Most of us believe in our heart-of-hearts that marital infidelity is wrong. The level of censure for extra marital affairs varies from the death penalty for women in some countries from Afghanistan to Qatar to French tolerance for ‘cinq a sept’ with a mistress. There are as many reasons for a bit on the side as there are individuals. Often the motivation for affairs is attributed to sex, the reasons are sometimes far more complex and are about deep-rooted psychological needs.
They may be about seeking solace from unhappy circumstance, to assuage grief or a search for emotional validation among a great many other reasons. It may be about boredom or a desire to replace the erotic intimacy that has faded in a marriage.
One of the commonest explanations is that individuals stray when their needs – emotional or sexual – are not being met with their spouse. The unfaithful partner may even justify an affair believing it has enabled them to stay in the marriage, even strengthening it. Or the affair may be acting out on an unconscious wish to end a marriage
According to British psychotherapist and author of Affairs Juliet Rosenfeld: “The roots for infidelity may lie years before those involved meet, in parent/ child relationships which impact on the adult self. However much we consciously try to get over those deficits and losses we suffer, our unconscious has other plans. They lurk around, coming to frustrate us and tempt us with things we know scare us excite us or fill us with forbidden desires.”
All very well to blame childhood experience for temptation but what about our adult conscience? “When an affair begins, the people involved silence part of themselves, the internal voice that stops us from doing dangerous or stupid things disappears. The risks are muted,” believes Rosenfeld.
“Then there is the challenge of being constant in long distance marriage, of being close and intimate with another over decades where love waxes and wanes. For some people, a lucky few, intimacy over decades comes easily, but for most of us it is a more bittersweet experience. Peaks and troughs, highs and lows, de-idealisation and recognition all have their place in long-term love.”
Hard to beat Shakespeare’s sonnet 116 though: “Let me not to the marriage of true minds admit impediment love is not love which alters when it alteration finds.”
Accurate figures for the frequency of affairs are hard to come by, given they are self-reported, probably more common that the estimated 25% of Irish couples involved. The figure is similar for the UK and in the US 25% of men and 15% of women say they have had one or more affairs.
Common or not, we are endlessly fascinated by affairs in novels, film and real life from Flaubert’s Madam Bovary to Fatal Attraction to tragic Princess Diana. Remember her TV comment about Charles’ affair with Camilla? “There were three of us in this marriage. So it was a bit crowed.”
Hopefully most of us are fascinated in theory but not in fact.
