In the movie, “Christmas Vacation”, after Clark Griswold is stunned by receiving a subscription to the jelly of the month club rather than his expected Christmas bonus. His brother in law, Eddie remarks, “It’s the gift that keeps on giving…”
I keep hearing Eddie’s line in my head each time I read about the latest wrinkle in the Ashley Madison story. The hack and the fallout continue providing new insights and revelations on the world of cheaters. After being hacked, the identities of many cheaters was exposed. Two enterprising students at the University of Toledo used the hacked data in mapping out where in the country the highest concentration of cheaters who are willing to pay for infidelity lived. They used the term ‘internet-facilitated infidelity’.
On reading the story, I found myself stunned at the location of ground zero. It was Fairfield County, Connecticut. This is the county containing the cities of Greenwich and Samford. I stopped for a moment and said to myself “I’ve been there! I have been to the epicenter of internet-facilitated infidelity.”
This information had me scouring through my field notes on that area and what can be learned from my field trip to ground zero.
First, the cities are well manicured New England towns, complete with their typical main street, clean environs, street clocks, upscale eating establishments, yachts and old buildings. They are proud of their colonial past, with local museums and streets named for their resident heroes of Putnam and Holley. They are also very affluent commuter communities. You have all the money of the big city with the surroundings of a smaller community.
These are not towns (or as they call them villages) filled with sex shops, news stands overflowing with nudie magazines and adult theaters. In fact, I don’t recall seeing any on my visits there. The people don’t dress sleazy or seductively. If anything, they attire themselves with a New England frumpiness.
The only hint of impropriety was the existence of an artist colony that attracted many bohemian types in the early 20th century located there. It was reportedly where American Impressionism started and was patronized by many free love types during its existence.
There is little suggesting that this is an infidelity hot spot.
The field trip told me that appearances are deceiving. This told me that many times, cheaters and infidelity don’t look like they are cheating. If anything, they look like they aren’t cheating. You may not find many signs of cheating even according to the latest list of signs indicative of cheating.
When things look too good, as Fairfield County did, it’s a concern. The reason is that cheaters often go to extremes in their behaviors. They go from being extremely good in order to cover their extremely naughty behaviors. Even when their caught, they want to fly to that other extreme. They continue going back and forth from one extreme to the other as if they were different worlds. Each world being the antithesis of the other. Perhaps this also explains why their church buildings are larger than average.
If things are going too well in your marriage, or the cheater has made too big a turn around it is reason for concern. If the cheater is now a saint with almost no human frailties to the point of being too good to be true, you may dealing with a “Village of Greenwich” type of moment, that what you are seeing is not what’s true.
The remedy for such situations is with the “How Can I Trust You Again?” video. Real trust is based on you knowing the real person rather than the squeaky clean persona. If you feel that your spouse is too good, there may be more going on. Since real trust requires many of the same qualities of people being honest and real, the lessons from “How Can I Trust You Again?” gives you a solid foundation needed in repairing marriages damaged by infidelity.
Best Regards,
Jeff
