Can you believe it? In a few weeks, it’ll be 2017 and that means that the iconic affair movie, Fatal Attraction will be 30 years old! The movie definitely struck a chord with many people on a sensitive topic. The movie also brought the term ‘bunny boiler’ into public consciousness.
Fatal Attraction makes you squirm when it comes to affairs, unlike so many that glamorize or make light of affairs. It hits you at a gut level and continues keeping you tense. When it came out, many of my fellow counselors pointed out the mental illness part of the Alex character. This way, they could attribute the extreme behavior to mental illness, rather than admit that affairs are traumatizing and take people to their breaking points.
In working with affairs over the years, I now view Fatal Attraction as a ‘warning label’ for affairs. It puts the danger of affairs in your face. The intense feelings that are stirred up and unleashed with affairs are powerful. You can’t predict what the outcomes will be.
In the Affair Recovery Survey I conducted, the percentage of you experiencing homicidal and suicidal thoughts (10-20%) related to the affair tells me there are strong feelings inside many of you. The intense feelings are real. Most of you don’t act on your feelings, but that doesn’t mean that the feelings don’t exist.
I also know that the Fatal Attraction situations don’t have to end ugly. The vandalized cars and bunny boiling does not have to happen.
Having grown up in a home where an affair tore my family apart, I know how real those feelings can be. I don’t wish them on anybody. That is another reason why I work at helping couples like you recover from affairs. I hate the pain. I am uncomfortable with the chord struck by real life Fatal Attraction situations.
That’s why I want you and those who are hurting like you to recover from the affair. In most situations your marriage can be saved. Although the popular statistics say about 60%, I believe that around 80% can be saved. This is why I put together the Affair Recovery Workshop, to help restore marriages and families like yours.
Hopefully nightmare situations like Fatal Attractions can turn into horror movies rather than become a real-life drama.
Best Regards,
Jeff
4 Responses
I remember when my husband told me he watched his movie
First of all I was surprised he had gone to see a movie mid day without me since we rarely went out to a movie even back then and that he went “alone” or so he said…..his was a few years before he started his adultery with the long term OW
Yoh would think that if the movie was that disturbing he would never have started up adultery with a total stranger who approached him in a restaurant …but none of the scary scenarios that might have been stopped him
It to mention the dangers he put all of us in and the disease I am left to deal with
He still doesn’t seem to realize the misery we fight off every day knowing we mean so little to him
He doesn’t even ask if the girls are ok…healthy….never mind me
I can’t help but wonder what it is that goes on in his mind as he continues on in the “life he always wanted”
No matter what that “life” does to damage everyone else
Zaza,
It does not sound like he took much away from Fatal Attraction. The risk if very real, as you know. The cheater often does not realize or consider the diseases or dangers they bring with them when they cheat. The assumption is made they can wash their hands and bodies and be done with it. The reality is that with each person you sleep with, a bonding occurs on multiple levels. You also bring the germs, diseases, etc. they have and expose any future persons to them as well. It’s just the biology of things. What you have been exposed to, you expose others to as well.
The ‘life’ definitely damages everything it touches, people, relationships, spiritual matters, thinking, etc.
It is because each one of them believe they are special. What they are doing is different than others. My wife, called an old friend of mine a cheater when his name came up. Yes, he cheated on his wife 20 years ago. She cheated on her husband just two years ago. They dont seem to see they are just the same…. nothing special at all.
David,
It’s always good hearing from you. They do believe they are ‘special’. The popular term these days is ‘entitled’. As a practitioner of psychology, I prefer the old term ‘self-centered narcissist’. It’s not only a self-focus, but also a sense of they ‘deserve’ the affair and that the typical rules don’t apply. The rules not only apply, they feel they are above such things as the law of cause and effect, shame and consequences.
Attempts at confronting them are often met with accusations of outdated morals, forcing religion on them, shaming them or being ‘old-fashioned’. If you’re a hipster, they may throw in sexist and misogynist or some other catchword of the day. They typically do some word calling and make you look bad for daring to question them.
If they saw themselves as being ‘just the same’, then they would be accountable for their actions and the consequences. They would realize that they didn’t deserve the affair, and that they aren’t special.