Huffington Post – 7 Signs You’re Slipping Into An Emotional Affair
Curious if you might be slipping into an emotional affair? It isn’t always easy to know the signs, or to understand when an acceptable friendship creeps into something more dangerous.
Huffington Post asked me how to know when a relationship crosses over into the tricky zone of an affair, and what you can do if it does. To read the full piece, click HERE.
1. You’re spending time together outside of work.
It may seem like a friendly work happy hour, but spending time with a coworker outside of the office can blur the lines of your friendship.
“Most people have emotional affairs with someone they work with or spend a lot of time with,” said Alicia H. Clark, a therapist in Washington, D.C. “It just so happens that this person turns out to be a really good friend. But a friend can turn into something more when your spouse isn’t your number one anymore.”
3. You’re having fantasies about that person.
If you’re beginning to daydream about that other person, or even see them in your dreams at night, your subconscious may be trying to tell you something.
“The biggest warning sign is when you start having intimate fantasies about that person,” Clark told The Huffington Post. “That to me is the number one. In my view, you’re already kind of hooked. When you have your first dream about that person, that is usually a very powerful sign.”
4. When something important happens, you think of telling your special friend before your partner.
Did you get a promotion? Maybe you won your office fantasy football league, or beat your personal record at the gym. Who do you want to tell first ― your friend, or your spouse?
“When you start telling that person things you wouldn’t tell your spouse, or you think about telling that person when something good happens, that’s not great a sign,” Clark said. “That’s an indication of closeness and that you’re both very important people to each other.”
