Thank You for Being a Friend

She wasn't really feeling much of anything except loneliness. Her affair just sort of happened, and when it did, she found it filled a different need for her. It fulfilled something that she'd been missing with her husband for a pretty long time. I don't know if I was looking for another relationship. I think I just was looking for someone to talk to. My husband's always at work. You know, we have no children, so I think I was just really looking for a good friend. But it just happened

to turn into something more than friends. The man Sabrina started cheating on her husband with made her feel good again, like she had a real companion, one who was actually invested in her. He tells me that I'm his best friend, and that just melts my heart. You know, not just oh you're my lover, You're just someone that I'm sleeping with. He tells me, I'm glad that I've met you. That must feel really nice to be seen like that. Yeah. Yeah, and I feel like he's my best friend as well.

I'm Joe Piazza and you're listening to She Wants More, the podcast where real women talk openly and honestly about the extra marital affairs that have completely changed their lives. Sabrina. That's not her real name, by the way. We changed it to protect her identity. Sabrina hasn't always been lonely in her marriage. When Sabrina and her husband first got together,

he was obsessed with her. My husband even has a tattoo with my name on it, which he did on my birthday, I believe, when I was turning thirty five. He surprised me. He came home one day with the tattoo on his neck. Did you like the tattoo? Yeah, I love it. I love it. I love it. That is love. Yes, I've never met anyone like him before, you know, And she was pretty obsessed with him too. How'd your husband proposed? I'm just actually I proposed to him. I asked him to marry me. Okay, I think you

were at his parents' house, I believe, or his sister's house. Yeah. Yeah, and I asked him to marry me. So in the beginning you were quite smitten. You said I want you. I choose you. Yes, yes, And we were together ten years. You know, we were married, so I said it, you know, it's time to get married. But that was more than twenty years ago. And after two decades with one person, things change. People change. I've been happy up until I

would say, maybe fifteen years into the marriage. You know, I love my husband, but you know, it's just that we are not very compatible anymore. He's much older than me. He's ten years older than me. Okay, so make a big difference. Yes, So he's not as active as I am. He likes to just you know, stay home and you know, do the boring stuff, the boring stuff. So he's not very active anymore like he used to be. He's not old, but you know, he just doesn't enjoy certain things anymore.

Sabrina was lonely. Her husband worked all the time. They had no kids, and she was home all day because of an injury that forced her to take a leave from more And it was ultimately that loneliness, not a desire for sex or passion, that let her to have an affair in the first place. Loneliness is currently a public health epidemic. That's psychiatrist doctor Gail Salts. We heard

from her in the last episode. I called Gail because I want to know a little bit more about how debilitating loneliness can truly be and what that loneliness can lead you to do. It is a huge cause of depression, anxiety disorders, health, physical health issues, and it is growing, and not in the elderly population where you think it would be growing, but all manner of ages. And it is a horrendous and desperate feeling, and so it will drive people to do all kinds of things to feel

less lonely. I asked Gail if she'd seen people turn to extra marital affairs to stave off their loneliness, even when they're married and they think they shouldn't be lonely because they've got their person already. Sometimes it's worth being with somebody that you feel alone with than being alone. Just because you're legally married to someone doesn't mean that you feel intimately connected to them and you can really

talk about your emotional state. And so one could definitely feel very lonely in a marriage and be wishing for and therefore actually making them vulnerable to who might come along that does listen to them and does make them feel heard and understood and empathized with and therefore really connected to. That definitely would easily be the beginning of at least an emotional affair and then possibly evolve into a physical affair. Sabrina never imagined being a cheater throughout

my years my relationships. You know, I never cheated. I was always just me and that person in the relationship. You know, I didn't see any to cheat, right, If you have to cheat, then you know you should just not be any relationship. That's how I felt back then. But now as I'm getting older, it just changed. My feelings just changed. As you get older, you need, you know, any more compassion in your life. So I didn't particularly

want something different, but I did want the attention. He wasn't giving me any attention, and the affair, it it just sort of happened. Nothing that I was set out to do, plan to do, it just sort of happened. And I gotta say, I get it. I understand why this situation was so appealing to Sabrina. Before this, she felt invisible when she first met her husband. He was the I who was obsessed with her, the guy who

tattooed her name on his neck. And then suddenly he was coming home from being at work all day and she felt like he didn't even see her. After the break, we'll hear more of Sabrina's story, starting with how she met the man who'd changed her life and everything that happened. Next, we're back with she once more. So Sabrina is out at this club for her friend's birthday and a guy comes along. He's handsome, and he's paying a lot of attention to her. He's younger than her husband, younger even

than her. He started talking and you just connected. He gave me his number. But the thing is he is also mad. Should we give him a name or should we call him Randy? Randy? Okay? When you and Randy first, was there a spark? Were you flirting? He was flirting? He was very good at flirting. We just had good conversation and you talk for hours, and you know, I've had a lot of things in common. It felt kind of strange, knowing I'm married talking with another man, flirting

with another man. So it was kind of strange but fun, I would say. And so he gave you his number, Yeah, because I don't want to give him my number, you know, right, right, And so the ball was in your court. Yeah, basically. Yes, Actually I waited two weeks before I called him. You know, I had to sit and think what am I doing? So yeah, I waited, waited two weeks before I called him. Sabrina was pretty nervous when she first called, and she didn't really think that anything was gonna come with us.

She thought it might just be a dinner, a chance to hang out with someone new, and that is it. I didn't want it to feel like a date, but it was actually a date, you know, so a married woman on a date. It didn't feel good at all, but it felt good, you know. It's at the same time, if you understand what I'm what I'm trying to say, Um, yeah, it was. It was. It was weird. It was weird, definitely weird. Did he think it was weird. Um, I

don't think so. No, No, he's a man, you know, man they are Yeah, they they don't care, no care. And when you went on the date, what did you think would happen? Did you think, all right, this will just be dinner. Um, yeah, I thought it would just be dinner. Maybe I wouldn't see him for a while, you know, we would be friends. That's what I thought

at first. Did you really think that? Yes? But even though Sabrina didn't intend to see Randy again, the attention that he gave her was so nice and put a little spring in her stuff, and it gave her something to look forward to. It was very exciting. Yeah. Yeah, it felt like something new and fresh. I just felt free. It's hard to explain. And there was a thrill in

the affair too, in the secrecy of it. Sabrina got a burner phone to arrange her meetings, and she started taking better care of her appearance, of herself and anticipation of seeing Randy again. We have se phones, you know, I have more than one cell phone. Then my husband doesn't know about so we text on those. Okay, okay, that part of it must be kind of exciting too, Yes,

it's very exciting. Yes, how is the sex different? It was different because he was Italian, that that was different, but just you know the fact that he was not African American me. So he was my first Italian man I've ever been with, you know, sexually, first, my god, first first man I cheated with first, first, everything first. For her, unlike for some of our other guests, the affair really seemed to be more about the attention and the friendship with Randy and how our time with him

made her feel better about herself and less lonely. Didn't feel like someone was seeing you in a new way too, because I feel like when yeah, yes, someone for such a long time, it's like you see me, it's the same way every day. Yes, definitely to have someone notice me. You know, my husband notices me, but like I said, things sometimes they get old. We don't really have anything really keeping us together, right, you know, it just felt good to have someone noticed me and send to my needs,

listen to me. I just felt like it's something that I needed, something I deserved. So I said, you know, why not? Why not? I just said, let me take care of me. There's something really powerful in that position and saying I'm going to do this one thing just for myself. Yeah, so I can be happy. I want to be happy. Did you feel like you've been taking care of just your husband for a long time? Ah, yes, very much so, and so to take care of yourself

must have felt really different. Yeah, definitely. It's not that people say, oh, yeah, that was a great thing to do, was to have an affair. It's more that when people are not talking about what they need to talk about, it comes out in their behaviors. That's doctor Laura Gottlieb. She's a psychotherapist, an author, and a podcast host. She wrote a best selling book that I Love, Love Love

called Maybe You Should to Someone. And So, if somebody is using an affair to say I didn't know how to take care of myself, I felt uncared for in my relationship and I didn't know any other way to take care of my needs, and then it gets the couple talking about the things that they needed to talk about long before that affair happened. It can have a really positive effect on the couple going forward if both people are invested in having those conversations and repairing the

marriage or the relationship. And then also creating something new that wasn't there before. But affairs are incredibly painful. There's just no way around that. I don't think that anybody goes around recommending that somebody have an affair. After the break, we'll hear more of Sabrina's story, including if she ever thinks she'll leave her husband. We're back with she wants more. I asked Sabrina what it was exactly about Randy that

made her feel so good, so much more alive. He's very touchy, feeling, but very attentive, you know as well, very attentive. He's just a good man. It's a good man, good person. For the two of them, it wasn't just about sex. It was also about companionship and connection, and both of them knew that they wanted to keep seeing one another, but they had to figure out how that was going to work. Randy was married too, but unlike Sabrina,

he had kids. The good thing was that Randy worked nights, which left his days mostly free, and that's when Sabrina happened to be available. But from the very start they knew they had to be careful. We don't meet on weekends, you know, my husban minutes at home on the weekends. We schedule certain days, certain times every week just to be safe because he has children, so his schedule is kind of more booked than mind. So we don't have much time to spend together. That's like maybe an hour

if that. Oh wow, so it's fast. It's fast when you guys meet. Where do you guys meet? Sometime we go, you have something to eat sometime, the hotel, you know, walk in the park, you know, something like that. If you weren't having the affair, how do you think you'd be spending your time? What would you be doing? The fellows hours, not doing much. I don't have many friends. I don't go out much until I met him. You know, I have something to do now to appropy my time.

What kind of boundaries did you guys set early on? You know, don't get involved in my marriage. I won't get involved in yours. You no phone calls my husband, no poem you know what I'm saying. If we have an argument or something like that, you're not going to do that. But a good thing about it is we're not jealous. You know, I'm not jealous of his relationship, is not jealous of minds because it's something that was there before me. You know, he was married to a

way before me. So right, that's something I have no control over. Basically, Sabrina told me that her affair with Randy has been going on for eight years now. Eight years. That's longer than my marriage, and it's a long time to see one another multiple times a week. I had to ask her one thing. I had to ask if, after all of that time together, all of these years together, if she's fallen in love with him. I would say yes, yes, Do you still love your husband? Oh? Yes, I love

my I will always love my husband always. How do you reconcile that in your head? That's a good question, That's a good question. That's something I will have to think about. Do you think your marriage is better now that you've given yourself this one thing? I will say yes because I'm able to tolerate my husband not paying me any attention, you know, because if he doesn't, the

other man will. So I'm like balanced, right. But recently, the guilt that Sabrina has felt juggling two different men has made her feel nervous, and she's been thinking a lot about the consequences of her affair and what would happen if her husband ever found out. It's a tricky, tricky situation because if my husband found out that I was having an affair, and say, like he left me, I feel like I would probably be out by myself, you know, I would be alone because I don't feel

that my lover would leave his wife. I don't know. I don't know, and vice versa. If his wife found out that he was having an affair, I don't know if I would leave my husband for him, right. So it's tricky, scary and tricky at the same time. So yeah,

and that I think about that situation a lot. Yeah, It's gotten to the point where I'm feeling like, now I don't know, maybe I should end this, you know, because of that situation, because I don't think I would leave if his wife left him, he would want to be with me, but I don't know if i'd be able to leave my husband to be with him, right and vice versa. You guys also don't know if you

would be compatible in the real world. In the real world, Yes, yes, yes, because now it's basically just having fun or whatever you want to call it. But yeah, I think about that situation a lot. Do you feel guilty, Yeah, I feel guilty. I feel guilty, and sometimes I feel like I might

wind up being alone, you know, do all of this. Yeah, so you know, you know, like they say karma, right, So I might wind up being alone in the whole situation, without my husband, without my lover, you know, without So it's just scary and that could be that seems like it could be terrifying. Yeah, and that could potentially happen if your husband did find out about the affair. Are you worried that you would be alone? But then also, you know, financially unstable or just unstable generally, Yes, I

think about that all the time. Yeah, I probably would be financially unstable, but I will be able to make it too. Yes. Do you ever think about are there any things that you'd dream that you could do with Randy? Like, do you ever think I'd love to go on vacation with Randy. I'd love to be able to do this thing that we can't do that's impossible for us to do. I would love to do that, but I know it's impossible, So I don't even think about it because right now

it's not possible. We both know that it's not possible. We just have what we have and that's just have to be enough for now until we decide if you want to be together and leave our spouses. But we haven't gotten there yet, so we just in the in the moment, in a moment, as I would say, there's something kind of beautiful about being in the moment, Yes,

in a moment. Next up, we'll be talking to a woman who doesn't just see her affair as a step in prioritizing her own emotional well being after having a child. It also became something so much more. It actually became an important part of her self care. So can an affair be a form of self care? That is all on next week's episode, This is She Wants More. I'm your host Joe Piazza. She Wants More was inspired by the book A Passion for More by Susan Shapiro Bearish.

It was adapted for audio by executive producers Merrill Poster, Kara Pfeiffer, and Susan Shapiro Parish. She Wants More is hosted and reported by me Joe Piazza. Jennifer Bassett is our lead producer and story editor. Our sound design is by Jessica crencich Our theme was composed by Anna Stumpf and Hamilton Lighthouser. Our executive producers for iHeart are Ally Perry and Nikki Etour. She Wants More as a production

of iHeart Podcasts. For more podcasts from iHeart, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.