‘I’ve been having an affair but haven’t heard from her since lockdown’

Dear Roe,
I was having an affair with a colleague which started last Christmas. I haven’t seen my colleague since the lockdown restriction measures and I don’t know when I will see her again. I’m married for five years and my colleague has a boyfriend, so we have both been unfaithful to our partners. We hadn’t spoken about how serious our relationship is or if and when it should stop. The affair took place around work hours, at lunchtime or after work. It was really exciting and we both seemed to enjoy acting like kids again. Since the lockdown, we are separated and I haven’t heard from my colleague frequently since it started. I want to see her and discuss what she wants. I’m not sure what I’m going to do. Can you help please?

In March (remember March, that month that happened 85 years ago?), writer Roxane Gay tweeted out a simple question that started a firestorm of speculation, anxiety and memes: “What are people having affairs doing to get through quarantine?”

I wondered whether during quarantine, I would receive some questions detailing the illicit and covert manoeuvrings of those people engaged in affairs, giving us a glimpse into affairs at an often unseen phase; not the guilt-ridden, passion-fuelled beginnings, or the disastrous, heartbreak-rippling endings, but the established middle phase: the day-to-day machinations of infidelity.

Instead, I got your detail-starved request for advice, almost dull in its summary-like structure with no insight or interiority. You’re like the anti-Normal People – all plot, no feeling, no chemistry, no emotion.

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This is what we call foreshadowing – I technically got what I wanted and, in the end, it did nothing for me.

In all seriousness, I find the lack of detail and introspection fascinating. I can’t telepathically divine why the woman you’re having an affair with isn’t contacting you, nor can I make her call you, though this does bring me to the first solid piece of advice I can give you: stop trying to contact her, immediately.

You don’t say if this woman lives with her boyfriend, but if she does and he hasn’t discovered your affair already, you contacting her now increases the risk, and that could be unsafe for her.

Discovering your partner has been having a months-long affair is never easy, and under lockdown when people’s normal support systems are gone, they’re under more psychological and financial stress, and they literally cannot get physical space from the person who has betrayed them, what would ordinarily be a deeply upsetting conversation could escalate.

Her lack of response is a response – she cannot or does not want to communicate right now, and you are not her priority

Even if all goes as well as it possibly could, you’re putting her and her boyfriend in an awful position by prioritising your desire to talk to her in a lockdown. Neither of them can leave or get space from each other right now. Don’t do that to either of them.

Also, if she really wanted to, she could probably send you a text explaining that she misses you but can’t talk – but she hasn’t. Her lack of response is a response – she cannot or does not want to communicate right now, and you are not her priority. I genuinely do empathise with how frustrating it must be not to hear from her. No matter what a relationship is, being suddenly ignored isn’t pleasant, but you must accept it.

Which means all you can do right now is look at yourself. You give no insight into your marriage, the reason the affair started, what this woman is like, and, most importantly, what you want. You say the reason you want to contact this woman is to discuss what she wants, but what do you want? And why? Do you know?

The only thing you say about the affair is that it was exciting and made you feel young again. Do you feel bored in your life and marriage? Why? Did you ever express these feelings to your spouse? Is there anything you could do to alleviate these feelings that doesn’t involve cheating on your spouse? Will your spouse discovering your affair still make you feel exciting and young, or exhausted, jaded, old?

Sooner or later, in one way or another, the affair will end. And the underlying issues that brought you here will still be there

Do you want to leave your spouse, either for this woman or just in general? Why is it that cheating is an option, but asking your wife to open up your marriage isn’t? Why do you find the betrayal and deceit and sneaking around of an affair appealing and exciting? If you leave your spouse, is this going to be a feature of all your future relationships? What does an ideal relationship look like to you? What do you need to do to have it? Outside of work, your marriage and the affair, who are you? What makes you feel fulfilled? Are you pursuing that?

I ask these questions for two reasons. First, because you are already discovering that your affair is a band-aid. It is a temporary fix that you have become dependent on and are struggling to cope without after just a few weeks; what happens when the affair ends? Because sooner or later, in one way or another, it will end. And the underlying issues that brought you here will still be there.

Second, I have no idea if you have ever asked these questions of yourself, and you need to. You are betraying the person you married, you have fundamentally changed the nature of your marriage, and if your affair is discovered your spouse will inevitably be devastated and possibly divorce you. Seeing as your affair takes place during work hours, you are also jeopardising your job and this woman’s job. It’s not apparent if you understand that, if you’re too busy letting quickies at work let you feel young again to realise that these are very adult stakes you’re playing with.

Neither you nor I can make this woman contact you or decide what she wants. But you can decide what you want; from this affair, from your marriage, from your life. Stop waiting for this woman to tell you what to do, for me to tell you what to do. You’ve had a few months of feeling like a kid. It’s time to be a grown-up again.

Roe McDermott is a writer and Fulbright scholar with an MA in sexuality studies from San Francisco State University. She is researching a PhD in gendered and sexual citizenship at the Open University and Oxford.

If you have a problem or query you would like her to answer (max 200 words), you can submit it anonymously at irishtimes.com/dearroe. Only questions selected for publication can be answered.